Substitution

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

    When some beloved voice that was to you
    Both sound and sweetness, faileth suddenly,
    And silence, against which you dare not cry,
    Aches round you like a strong disease and new
    What hope? what help? what music will undo
    That silence to your sense? Not friendship's sigh,
    Not reason's subtle count; not melody
    Of viols, nor of pipes that Faunus blew;
    Not songs of poets, nor of nightingales
    Whose hearts leap upward through the cypress-trees
    To the clear moon; nor yet the spheric laws
    Self-chanted, nor the angels' sweet 'All hails,'
    Met in the smile of God: nay, none of these.
    Speak thou, availing Christ! and fill this pause.