Ye desolate children of sorrow
As fleet as the bloom of May,
Your dreams of a brighter morrow,
Your hopes, have they pass’d away?
The chill breath of time, does it wither
The bough where ye build your nest?
Ah, come then, ye mourners, come hither,
I’ll tell you of endless rest.
I’ll tell you of Him who hath spoken
Sweet peace to my weary heart,
And healed it, though wither’d and broken,
With love’s all-availing art.
It was He, ‘twas the Lord of Glory,
Who died on the cursed tree,
On Calvary, stricken and gory,
A suffering Lamb for me.
Alone on the desolate mountains,
With tangled and sullied fleece,
I wander’d afar from the fountains
Of holiness, life, and peace;
Till He o’er the hills, like a shepherd,
In quest of His stray one, pass’d,
And saved from the lion and leopard
The life of my soul at last.
Ye who dwell like a trembling sparrow
Alone on a leafless bough,
From the point of the archer’s arrow
Defenseless, unshelter’d now,
Fly, fly to the Saviour-come hither,
From sorrow, from fear and strife,
To a branch that will never wither—
Come dwell in the tree of life.