Father Ryan's Poems (53)

    Sweet, blessed beads！ I would not part With one of you for richest gem² That gleams in kingly diadem³； Ye know the history of my heart.

    For I have told you every grief In all the days of twenty years, And I have moistened you with tears, And in your decades found relief.

    Ah！ time has fled, and friends have failed And joys have died； but in my needs Ye were my friends, my blessed beads！ And ye consoled me when I wailed⁴.

    For many and many a time, in grief, My weary fingers wandered round Thy circled chain, and always found In some Hail Mary sweet relief.

    How many a story you might tell Of inner life, to all unknown； trusted you and you alone, But ah！ ye keep my secrets well.

    Ye are the only chain I wear —— A sign that I am but the slave, In life, in death, beyond the grave, Of Jesus and His Mother fair.