Once more September comes, and the fourth day,

Day when I first saw day.

How many more Septembers, and fourth days,

Lord, will you suffer me?

I ask no more: the distance that I’ve come

Is no unreasonable one:

And from my cradle to this point I’ve trod

Many thousand paces

(With falls, dear God, and risings as you know):

He who must travel through

Sufferings just as mine and joys the same

Would surely think again,

Three times, were it best done or left undone.

Lord, let me now be gone:

My part is played, and all that there can be

Of joy or misery,

Has come to me in turn, and what shall come

Shall nothing add to all.

It shall the old shadow be of things that seem,

And vanish coming near.

What do I hope on earth, why not now leave?

I wait, Lord, your reprieve.

But, add one favour more to many granted,

Let me so learn departure,

That every eye that sees the manner of my going

Would wish my death his own.