White Paper
SNOWY-SMOOTH beneath the pen—
Richest field that iron ploughs,
Germinating thoughts of men,
Tho’ no heaven its rain allows.
There they ripen, thousand-fold;
And our spirits reap the corn,
In a day-long dream of gold—
Food for all the souls unborn.
Like the murmur of the earth,
When we listen stooping low,
Like sap singing nature’s mirth
Foaming up the trees that grow.
Evermore a subtle song
Sings the pen unto it, while
Fluid idea flows along,
Each new Era’s mother-Nile.
Greater than ensphering Sea,
For it holds the sea and land;
Seed of every deed to be
Down its current borne like sand.
I caress thy surface sheer,
Holding thee the Absolute;
Where the things to be inhere,
Waiting their material bruit.
How I love thee! my heart’s blood
Were too dull to smutch thy white!
I’ll aver: no lily’s bud
Lays such unction on my sight.
Suave of maiden’s throat or arm,
Bliss embodied to the touch,
Has not such ambrosial charm—
Not a marble Goddess such!
Dear White Paper! All To-day
Palpitates with spirit-heat—
Only on thy whiteness may
Seers translate its rhythms sweet!
Holy Paper! all the Past
Were a rack of ruined cloud
Stripping from our orbit vast,
But thou Eternity endowed
With an actual soul of speech—
Life of life by death distilled—
That all dateless days shall reach,
As life’s vine of veins is filled.
O, the glorious Heavens wrought
By Cadmean souls of yore
From pure element of Thought!
And thy leaves their silvern door!
Light they open, and we stand
Past the sovereignty of Fate;
Glad among Them, still and grand,
The Creators and Create
poem by Sydney Wheeler Jephcott
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Related quotes
The Hamadryad.
Last night I was like one who prayed
Beneath a mystic tree
Whose windless leaves a murmur made,
As if it there might be
A spirit in the sap that laid
Its spell on them and me.
A creature who, invisible,
In sorrow and in mirth,
Through summer's heat or when the chill
Is on the dreaming Earth,
Sings as in sleep divinely still
The secret of its birth.
(And as it sings, possessed, apart
From all things far and near,
The music of its own strange heart
Is all it seems to hear,
As if its ardour made an art
Of its own atmosphere.
Still none who come there hear the song
Until their souls are bowed
Beneath the mystic boughs, among
Whose living leaves a crowd
Of spirit voices, weak and strong,
Sing all that God allowed).
Oh! wondrous was that faery strain,
Too holy to be heard
But by the soul with no profane
Imagination stirr'd —
Like a seer when his heart and brain
Are in the coming word,
And he bows low before the breath
Of that which, as a flame,
All that he is illumineth
And calls him as by name,
When one to him are Life and Death,
One honour and one shame.
Ah! so possessed I heard them sing,
The many voices who
Were the sense of a secret thing
That with the tree-life grew,
As it did from the same seed spring
And a dream-breath from it drew —
The mystic life which God had shut
Within the dark seed's core,
Diverse from all that He had put
In others evermore —
No hint of death behind it, but
Of life that is before!
The tree-life in more lives than this —
Of that it sings for aye —
And as I listened the world's hiss
In silence died away,
And the perfect life for all that is
Like a dream on me lay.
poem by Robert Crawford
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Song Of The Spirit
Too sweet and too subtle for pen or for tongue
In phrases unwritten and measures unsung,
As deep and as strange as the sounds of the sea,
Is the song that my spirit is singing to me.
In the midnight and tempest when forest trees shiver,
In the roar of the surf, and the rush of the river,
In the rustle of leaves and the fall of the rain,
And on the low breezes I catch the refrain.
From the vapours that frame and envelop the earth,
And beyond, from the realms where my spirit had birth,
From the mists of the land and the fogs of the sea,
For ever and ever the songs come to me.
I know not its wording - its import I know -
For the rhythm is broken, the measure runs low,
When vexed or allured by the things of this life
My soul is merged into its pleasures or strife.
When up to the hill tops of beauty and light
My soul like a lark in the ether takes flight,
And the white gates of heaven shine brighter and nearer,
The song of the spirit grows sweeter and clearer.
Up, up to the realms where no mortal has trod -
Into space and infinity near to my God -
With whiteness, and silence, and beautiful things,
I am bourne when the voice of eternity sings.
When once in the winds or the dropp of the rain
Thy spirit shall listen and hear the refrain,
Thy soul shall soar up like a bird on the breeze,
And the things that have pleased thee will never more please.
poem by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
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Said The Thistle-Down
'If thou wilt hold my silver hair,
O Lady sweet and bright;
I'll bring thee, maiden darling, where
Thy lover is to-night.
Lay down thy robe of cloth of gold--
Gold, weigheth heavily,
Thy necklace wound in jewell'd fold,
And hie thee forth with me.'
'O Thistle-down, dear Thistle-down,
I've laid my robe aside;
My necklace and my jewell'd crown,
And yet I cannot glide
Along the silver crests of night
With thee, light thing, with thee.
Rain would I try the airy flight,
What sayest thou to me?'
'If thou wilt hold my silver hair,
O maiden fair and proud;
We'll float upon the purple air
High as yon lilied cloud.
There is a jewel weighs thy heart;
If thou with me wouldst glide
That cold, cold jewel place apart--
The jewel of thy pride!'
'O Thistle-down, dear Thistle-down
That jewel part I've set;
With golden robe and shining crown
And cannot follow yet!
Fain would I clasp thy silver tress
And float on high with thee;
Yet somewhat me to earth doth press--
What sayest thou to me?
'If thou wilt hold my silver hair
O lady, sweet and chaste;
We'll dance upon the sparkling air
And to thy lover haste.
A lily lies upon thy breast
Snow-white as it can be--
It holds thee strong--sweet, with the rest
Yield lilied chastity.'
'O Thistle-down, false Thistle-down
I've parted Pride and Gold;
Laid past my jewels and my crown--
My golden robings' fold.
I will not lay my lily past--
Love's light as vanity
When to the mocking wind is cast
The lily, Chastity.'
poem by Isabella Valancy Crawford
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The Perpetual Wooing
The dull world clamors at my feet
And asks my hand and helping sweet;
And wonders when the time shall be
I'll leave off dreaming dreams of thee.
It blames me coining soul and time
And sending minted bits of rhyme--
A-wooing of thee still.
Shall I make answer? This it is:
I camp beneath thy galaxies
Of starry thoughts and shining deeds;
And, seeing new ones, I must needs
Arouse my speech to tell thee, dear,
Though thou art nearer, I am near--
A-wooing of thee still.
I feel thy heart-beat next mine own;
Its music hath a richer tone.
I rediscover in thine eyes
A balmier, dewier paradise.
I'm sure thou art a rarer girl--
And so I seek thee, finest pearl,
A-wooing of thee still.
With blood of roses on thy lips--
Canst doubt my trembling?--something slips
Between thy loveliness and me--
So commonplace, so fond of thee.
Ah, sweet, a kiss is waiting where
That last one stopped thy lover's prayer--
A-wooing of thee still.
When new light falls upon thy face
My gladdened soul discerns some trace
Of God, or angel, never seen
In other days of shade and sheen.
Ne'er may such rapture die, or less
Than joy like this my heart confess--
A-wooing of thee still.
Go thou, O soul of beauty, go
Fleet-footed toward the heavens aglow.
Mayhap, in following, thou shalt see
Me worthier of thy love and thee.
Thou wouldst not have me satisfied
Until thou lov'st me--none beside--
A-wooing of thee still.
This was a song of years ago--
Of spring! Now drifting flowers of snow
Bloom on the window-sills as white
As gray-beard looking through love's light
And holding blue-veined hands the while.
He finds her last--the sweetest smile--
A-wooing of her still.
poem by Eugene Field
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The Dead Child
ALL silent is the room,
There is no stir of breath,
Save mine, as in the gloom
I sit alone with Death.
Short life it had, the sweet,
Small babe here lying dead,
With tapers at its feet
And tapers at its head.
Dear little hands, too frail
Their grasp on life to hold;
Dear little mouth so pale,
So solemn, and so cold;
Small feet that nevermore
About the house shall run;
Thy little life is o’er!
Thy little journey done!
Sweet infant, dead too soon,
Thou shalt no more behold
The face of sun or moon,
Or starlight clear and cold;
Nor know, where thou art gone,
The mournfulness and mirth
We know who dwell upon
This sad, glad, mad, old earth.
The foolish hopes and fond
That cheat us to the last
Thou shalt not feel; beyond
All these things thou hast passed.
The struggles that upraise
The soul by slow degrees
To God, through weary days—
Thou hast no part in these.
And at thy childish play
Shall we, O little one,
No more behold thee? Nay,
No more beneath the sun.
Death’s sword may well be bared
’Gainst those grown old in strife,
But, ah! it might have spared
Thy little unlived life.
Why talk as in despair?
Just God, whose rod I kiss,
Did not make thee so fair
To end thy life at this.
There is some pleasant shore—
Far from His Heaven of Pride,
Where those strong souls who bore
His Cross in bliss abide—
Some place where feeble things,
For Life’s long war too weak,
Young birds with unfledged wings,
Buds nipped by storm-winds bleak,
Young lambs left all forlorn
Beneath a bitter sky,
Meek souls to sorrow born,
Find refuge when they die.
There day is one long dawn,
And from the cups of flowers
Light dew-filled clouds updrawn
Rain soft and perfumed showers.
Child Jesus walketh there
Amidst child-angel bands,
With smiling lips, and fair
White roses in His hands.
I kiss thee on the brow,
I kiss thee on the eyes—
Farewell! Thy home is now
The Children’s Paradise.
poem by Victor James Daley
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The Ideal
"How the shadow the Ideal throws before it darkens the actual." -- Zanoni
"La vie est un sommeil, l'amour en est le rêve;."
A sad, sweet dream; it fell upon my soul
When song and thought first woke their echoes there,
Swaying my spirit to its wild control,
And with the shadow of a fond despair
Darkening the fountain of my young life's stream --
It haunts me still, and yet I know 'tis but a dream.
Whence art thou, shadowy presence, that canst hide
From my charmed sight the glorious things of earth?
A mirage o'er life's desert dost thou glide?
Or, with those glimmerings of a former birth,
A "trailing cloud of glory," hast thou come
From some bright world afar, our unremembered home?
I know thou dwell'st not in this dull cold Real,
I know thy home is in some brighter sphere;
I know I shall not meet thee, my Ideal!
In the dark wanderings that await me here --
Why comes thy gentle image then to me,
Wasting my night of life in one long dream of thee!
The city's peopled solitude, the glare
Of festal halls, moonlight and music's tone,
All breathe the sad refrain thou art not there;
And even with Nature, I am still alone;
With joy I watch her summer bloom depart --
I love drear winter's reign -- 'tis winter in my heart.
And if I sigh upon my brow to see
The deepening shadow of Time's fleeting wing,
'Tis for the youth I might not give to thee, --
The vanished brightness of my first sweet spring;
That I might give thee not the joyous form,
Unsworn by bitter tears, unblighted by the storm.
And when the hearts I should be proud to win,
Breathe, in those tones that woman holds so dear,
Words of impassioned homage unto mine,
Coldly and harsh they fall upon my ear;
And as I listen to the fervent vow,
My weary heart replies, "Alas! it is not thou!"
And when the thoughts within my spirit glow,
That would outpour themselves in words of fire,
If some kind influence bade the music flow,
Like that which woke the notes of Memnon's lyre;
Thou, sunlight of my life! wakest not the lay --
And song within my heart unuttered dies away.
Depart, oh shadow! fatal dream, depart!
Go, I conjure thee; leave me this poor life,
And I will meet with firm, heroic heart,
Its threatening storms and its tumultuous strife,
And with the Poet-Seer will see thee stand,
To welcome my approach to thine own Spirit-land.
poem by Anne Lynch Botta from Poems (1848)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Death
To the souls who live beneath our feet
To souls burdened by the dreadful dirt.
When I think of thee my heart beat
My soul to the ground, I feel thy hurt.
Through sympathy I think
Thou know the end of mirth
And life here and what it's worth
Please! speak to me so I may give birth
To thy anguish above on beautiful earth.
Me received no reply but a deep buried sigh…
For the leaden stone covers thy head
The squalid worms live in thy bed
I see thou drink from the roots of flowers
and thy see each one to its final hours.
As time passes
Slumber do thee too
Under the pure white snow
where frigid frost freezes thy bones
into an icy blue
I feel your pain can never move;
a pain no living soul can ever know….
Suddenly I hear a voice murmur from inside of me...
Thou speak quietly while we sleep in peace
And in our memories thou silent voices cease
Till we see a name carved on grave's cement stone
Thou souls beneath remain unknown
My Love reaches the depths of death's dark seat but my life lives upon my light feet... never again will I love, but always shall I live? I hope...
To the souls whom I love beneath my feet
May I tread softly and saunter sweetly as if life's a treat.
Till the death's knight comes again to ravenously eat
My flesh away, then only and then
I swear our souls shall meet again.....
poem by Kevin Michael Murphy
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My Soul And I
Stand still, my soul, in the silent dark
I would question thee,
Alone in the shadow drear and stark
With God and me!
What, my soul, was thy errand here?
Was it mirth or ease,
Or heaping up dust from year to year?
'Nay, none of these!'
Speak, soul, aright in His holy sight
Whose eye looks still
And steadily on thee through the night
'To do His will!'
What hast thou done, O soul of mine,
That thou tremblest so?
Hast thou wrought His task, and kept the line
He bade thee go?
Aha! thou tremblest!--well I see
Thou 'rt craven grown.
Is it so hard with God and me
To stand alone?
Summon thy sunshine bravery back,
O wretched sprite!
Let me hear thy voice through this deep and black
Abysmal night.
What hast thou wrought for Right and Truth,
For God and Man,
From the golden hours of bright-eyed youth
To life's mid span?
What, silent all! art sad of cheer?
Art fearful now?
When God seemed far and men were near,
How brave wert thou!
Ah, soul of mine, thy tones I hear,
But weak and low,
Like far sad murmurs on my ear
They come and go.
I have wrestled stoutly with the Wrong,
And borne the Right
From beneath the footfall of the throng
To life and light.
'Wherever Freedom shivered a chain,
God speed, quoth I;
To Error amidst her shouting train
I gave the lie.'
Ah, soul of mine! ah, soul of mine!
Thy deeds are well:
Were they wrought for Truth's sake or for thine?
My soul, pray tell.
'Of all the work my hand hath wrought
Beneath the sky,
Save a place in kindly human thought,
No gain have I.'
Go to, go to! for thy very self
Thy deeds were done
Thou for fame, the miser for pelf,
Your end is one!
And where art thou going, soul of mine?
Canst see the end?
And whither this troubled life of thine
Evermore doth tend?
What daunts thee now? what shakes thee so?
My sad soul say.
'I see a cloud like a curtain low
Hang o'er my way.
'Whither I go I cannot tell
That cloud hangs black,
High as the heaven and deep as hell
Across my track.
'I see its shadow coldly enwrap
The souls before.
Sadly they enter it, step by step,
To return no more.
'They shrink, they shudder, dear God! they kneel
To Thee in prayer.
They shut their eyes on the cloud, but feel
That it still is there.
'In vain they turn from the dread Before
To the Known and Gone;
For while gazing behind them evermore
Their feet glide on.
'Yet, at times, I see upon sweet pale faces
A light begin
To tremble, as if from holy places
And shrines within.
'And at times methinks their cold lips move
With hymn and prayer,
As if somewhat of awe, but more of love
And hope were there.
'I call on the souls who have left the light
To reveal their lot;
I bend mine ear to that wall of night,
And they answer not.
'But I hear around me sighs of pain
And the cry of fear,
And a sound like the slow sad dropping of rain,
Each drop a tear!
'Ah, the cloud is dark, and day by day
I am moving thither
I must pass beneath it on my way--
God pity me!--whither?'
Ah, soul of mine! so brave and wise
In the life-storm loud,
Fronting so calmly all human eyes
In the sunlit crowd!
Now standing apart with God and me
Thou art weakness all,
Gazing vainly after the things to be
Through Death's dread wall.
But never for this, never for this
Was thy being lent;
For the craven's fear is but selfishness,
Like his merriment.
Folly and Fear are sisters twain
One closing her eyes.
The other peopling the dark inane
With spectral lies.
Know well, my soul, God's hand controls
Whate'er thou fearest;
Round Him in calmest music rolls
Whate'er thou Nearest.
What to thee is shadow, to Him is day,
And the end He knoweth,
And not on a blind and aimless way
The spirit goeth.
Man sees no future,--a phantom show
Is alone before him;
Past Time is dead, and the grasses grow,
And flowers bloom o'er him.
Nothing before, nothing behind;
The steps of Faith
Fall on the seeming void, and find
The rock beneath.
The Present, the Present is all thou hast
For thy sure possessing;
Like the patriarch's angel hold it fast
Till it gives its blessing.
Why fear the night? why shrink from Death;
That phantom wan?
There is nothing in heaven or earth beneath
Save God and man.
Peopling the shadows we turn from Him
And from one another;
All is spectral and vague and dim
Save God and our brother!
Like warp and woof all destinies
Are woven fast,
Linked in sympathy like the keys
Of an organ vast.
Pluck one thread, and the web ye mar;
Break but one
Of a thousand keys, and the paining jar
Through all will run.
O restless spirit! wherefore strain
Beyond thy sphere?
Heaven and hell, with their joy and pain,
Are now and here.
Back to thyself is measured well
All thou hast given;
Thy neighbor's wrong is thy present hell,
His bliss, thy heaven.
And in life, in death, in dark and light,
All are in God's care
Sound the black abyss, pierce the deep of night,
And He is there!
All which is real now remaineth,
And fadeth never
The hand which upholds it now sustaineth
The soul forever.
Leaning on Him, make with reverent meekness
His own thy will,
And with strength from Him shall thy utter weakness
Life's task fulfil;
And that cloud itself, which now before thee
Lies dark in view,
Shall with beams of light from the inner glory
Be stricken through.
And like meadow mist through autumn's dawn
Uprolling thin,
Its thickest folds when about thee drawn
Let sunlight in.
Then of what is to be, and of what is done,
Why queriest thou?
The past and the time to be are one,
And both are now!
poem by John Greenleaf Whittier
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Keeper of the Ancient Doors
Thou Keeper of the ancient doors
Thou Angel of the deep in the light
Thou Spirit in the seers of the times of yore
Thou that keeps the secrets of the distant future
Thou that preserves the history of the ancient past
Grant thou me entrance through thy door
That I may see into the future with thee
For unto the prince of darkness the world shall turn
Save thou grant the son of light the future’s light
Unstop my ears to the whispers from the future
Enlighten my eyes to behold the things that shall be
Grant thou me the spirit of the future today
That I might ride on his wings to times yet unborn
Let me soar on the wings of the eagle from the future
That I may see beyond the now and the near
For unto thee the future is as history in the open
And before thy eyes is nothing ever concealed at-all
Quicken my discernment in line with thine
That I may discern the way thou doesth
Move my heart beyond the things of now
That my passions may be for things unseen
Come unto me oh Spirit of the ancient seers
Come now unto me thou companion of the seers of light
Spirits of my kinds that treaded these realms before me
Grant unto me thine eyes to see beyond the times of now
And spare thou me thy ears to hear from the future
Say unto me the mysteries that are hidden
Open unto me the choices of men yet unmade
Thou that knowest tomorrow teach thou me
Thou that seeesth tomorrow show thou me
Beyond the quest for the things of now
I crave to see the things to come
As my destiny and inheritance in the light
Thou that came upon Daniel here am I for thee
Thou that came upon John descend now on me
Thou Spirit that was on Patmos be my guide today
Possess thou me, Spirit of the seers in the light
Open am I unto all thy visions
And unto thy voice I yield this day
Grant thou me the pass to the future thou seeth
Thou Keeper of the ancient doors
-Samson Ajilore 25: 06: ’11,1pm FCT
poem by Samson Ajilore
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A Dialogue Betwixt God And The Soul
Soul.
Whilst my Souls eye beheld no light
But what stream'd from thy gracious sight
To me the worlds greatest King,
Seem'd but some little vulgar thing.
God.
Whilst thou prov'dst pure; and that in thee
I could glass all my Deity;
How glad did I from Heaven depart,
To find a lodging in thy heart!
S. Now Fame and Greatness bear the sway,
('Tis they that hold my prisons Key):
For whom my soul would die, might she
Leave them her Immortalitie.
G. I, and some few pure Souls conspire,
And burn both in a mutual fire,
For whom I'd die once more, ere they
Should miss of Heavens eternal day.
S. But Lord! what if I turn again,
And with an adamantine chain,
Lock me to thee? What if I chase
The world away to give thee place?
G. Then though these souls in whom I joy
Are Seraphims, Thou but a toy,
A foolish toy, yet once more I
Would with thee live, and for thee die.
poem by Henry Wotton
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Patria
I would not even ask my heart to say
If I could love some other land as well
As thee, my country, had I felt the spell
Of Italy at birth, or learned to obey
The charm of France, or England's mighty sway.
I would not be so much an infidel
As once to dream, or fashion words to tell,
What land could hold my love from thee away.
For like a law of nature in my blood
I feel thy sweet and secret sovereignty,
And woven through my soul thy vital sign.
My life is but a wave, and thou the flood;
I am a leaf and thou the mother-tree;
Nor should I be at all, were I not thine.
poem by Henry Van Dyke
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The Circumcision Of Christ
The year begins with Thee,
And Thou beginn'st with woe,
To let the world of sinners see
That blood for sin must flow.
Thine infant cries, O Lord,
Thy tears upon the breast,
Are not enough--the legal sword
Must do its stern behest.
Like sacrificial wine
Poured on a victim's head
Are those few precious drops of Thine,
Now first to offering led.
They are the pledge and seal
Of Christ's unswerving faith
Given to His Sire, our souls to heal,
Although it cost His death.
They to His Church of old,
To each true Jewish heart,
In Gospel graces manifold
Communion blest impart.
Now of Thy love we deem
As of an ocean vast,
Mounting in tides against the stream
Of ages gone and past.
Both theirs and ours Thou art,
As we and they are Thine;
Kings, Prophets, Patriarchs--all have part
Along the sacred line.
By blood and water too
God's mark is set on Thee,
That in Thee every faithful view
Both covenants might see.
O bond of union, dear
And strong as is Thy grace!
Saints, parted by a thousand year,
May thus in heart embrace.
Is there a mourner true,
Who fallen on faithless days,
Sighs for the heart-consoling view
Of those Heaven deigned to praise?
In spirit may'st thou meet
With faithful Abraham here,
Whom soon in Eden thou shalt greet
A nursing Father dear.
Would'st thou a poet be?
And would thy dull heart fain
Borrow of Israel's minstrelsy
One high enraptured strain?
Come here thy soul to tune,
Here set thy feeble chant,
Here, if at all beneath the moon,
Is holy David's haunt.
Art thou a child of tears,
Cradled in care and woe?
And seems it hard, thy vernal years
Few vernal joys can show?
And fall the sounds of mirth
Sad on thy lonely heart,
From all the hopes and charms of earth
Untimely called to part?
Look here, and hold thy peace:
The Giver of all good
E'en from the womb takes no release
From suffering, tears, and blood.
If thou would'st reap in love,
First sow in holy fear:
So life a winter's morn may prove
To a bright endless year.
poem by John Keble
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Look Unto Me, And Be Ye Saved
As the serpent raised by Moses
Healed the burning serpent's bite;
Jesus thus himself discloses
To the wounded sinner's sight:
Hear his gracious invitation,
I have life and peace to give,
I have wrought out full salvation,
Sinner, look to me and live.
Pore upon your sins no longer,
Well I know their mighty guilt;
But my love than death is stronger,
I my blood have freely spilt:
Though your heart has long been hardened,
Look on me - it soft shall grow;
Past transgressions shall be pardoned,
And I'll wash you white as snow.
I have seen what you were doing,
Though you little thought of me;
You were madly bent on ruin,
But I said - It shall not be:
You had been for ever wretched,
Had I not espoused your part;
Now behold my arms outstretched
To receive you to my heart.
Well may shame, and joy, and wonder,
All your inward passions move;
I could crush thee with my thunder,
But I speak to thee in love:
See! your sins are all forgiven,
I have paid the countless sum!
Now my death has opened heaven,
Thither you shall shortly come.
Dearest Saviour, we adore thee
For thy precious life and death;
Melt each stubborn heart before thee,
Give us all the eye of faith:
From the law's condemning sentence,
To thy mercy we appeal;
Thou alone canst give repentance,
Thou alone our souls canst heal.
poem by John Newton
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Introit : VIII. The Golden Joy
What has the poet but a glorious phrase
And the heart's wisdom? -- Oh, a Joy of gold!
A Joy to mint and squander on the Kind,--
Pure gold coined current for eternity,
Giving dear wealth to men for a long age,
And after, lost to sight and touch of hands,
Leaving a memory that will bud and bloom
And blossom all into a lyric phrase--
The glorious phrase again on other lips,
The heritage of Joy, the heart again,
Wisdom anew that ages not but lives
To Sappho-sing the Poet else forgot.
O Joy! O secret transport of mystic vision,
Who hold'st the keys of Ivory and Horn,
Who join'st the hands of Earth and Faerie!
Thou art the inmate of the hermit soul
That shuns the touch of every street-worn wind
Sweet to all else, the shuns doctrine and doubt,
To wait in trembling quietness for thee.
Thou art the spouse of the busy human mind
That bravely, sanely, bears his worldly part
And claims no favour for the gift of thee:
But, Nature's child, lives true in Nature's right,
Filling the duties of the Tribe of Man,
Keeping the heart, O Joy! untarnished still
And pinion-strong to soar the exalted way.
The Poet guards the philosophic soul
In contemplation that no importunate thought
May mar his ecstasy or change his song;
And though he see the gloom and sing of sorrow,
He is the world's Herald of Joy at last:
His song is Joy, the music that needs sorrow
To fill its closes, as Death fulfils Life,
As Life fills Time, and Time Eternity:
Joy that sees Death, yet in Death sees not woe.
O Joy! the Spring is green -- on many a wall
The roses straggle, on many a tree dew-laden;
And now the waters murmur 'neath their banks
And all the flocks are loud with firstling cries,
And in the heart of life Joy wakes anew
To live a long day ere the winter falls;
And now the song of an invisible lark,
And now a child's voice makes the morning glad;
The kindling sky and the mist-wreathed earth
Have broken from the drowsihood of night,--
Dawn widened grey, but now the orient blush
Is over all the roses on the wall,
Over the drooping trees that wait the winds
To join them to the murmur of the day.
The Pilgrim Seer who journeyed silently
When all the ways were Winter, wild and bare,
Tarries to-day to hear the call of bliss,--
Of Joy, Joy, Joy! thou emblem, symbol, sign
Of all the Pilgrim's dream of Paradise--
The Beatific Vision of Beauty supreme!
Thou art the Angel of the Gate of Heaven!
Thou art the great Vice-regent of the King!
Then forward goes and will not brook Life's house,
Yearning to dwell far away, far away,
In the wide palace of Eternity--
To hold a life beyond this birth and death
With the high Prophets in their calm sublime.--
Ah yet, in Joy's despite, his heart will keep
Memorial futile melancholy thought
Of this and some that never knew the gold!
And so he turns, bows down to toil with men,
To toil and strive and care for earthy cares;
The common life that has her claim on all
Claims him, and yet leaves him his ecstasy;
Knowing the glooms of life and the dark nights,
Sure of the dawns and the white Summer days,
He sings in twilight and the state of Job
One golden Dawn and one enduring Wealth!
So he keeps ever burning in his heart
The fire eternal that will flame and shine
When the man lies compounded with the rest
Who never knew to look upon his light,
Whose light none saw, whose lives are all forgot.
One is Eternity to common man,
Twain to the poet soul;-- though his name die,
Though after fall of years many or few
His phrases wander out of memory's fold,
His soul is twain, a heritage has he,
His dreams are children dreams and parent dreams.
What has the Poet but a glorious phrase
And the heart's wisdom? He has naught to do
With April changes that your lives endue,
Sunshine and shadow. Him your blame and praise
Trouble in calm along the spirit's ways
That are with the great Change, unchanging, true,
With the great Silence where no voice is new
And no voice old -- a train of prophet days.
What but the Golden Joy that sacred stands
As gift of Paradise to human art?
For though the lust of the world still claims and brands
All others, the Joy stands for us apart
And will not fail or tarnish touched by hands
That highly bear the trust of poet heart.
So would I rhythm and rime the glorious phrase
In this Spring lyric morning of my day,
When brown and green and nebulous silver lie
Quiet and happy 'neath the vernal pomp
Of that rich sky,--- the trees a dome of song,
Song in the waters, in the sea-born wind,
And in the human soul the Cherub hymn
Of Joy, which is the heart's philosophy.
Dear holy hymn, yet wert thou sad to hear
Matched with the dream song of the Ivory Gate
That waked a boy to rapture long ago,
That raised a boy to poet in an hour,
That the boy failed to mimic with his voice
But held heart-hid against his vocal day
And sings here to thee, Joy, this lyric morn!
For first he sang out of a book of Death
Before his day, and then with weaker voice
Chanted a resurrection, sang for Hope
All in a Spring like this, before his day.
Of Beauty now which is the light of Hope
He sings and of the Quest that cannot cease
Voyaging to Wonder on an endless road;
But chiefly and over all and through the whole
Sings yet the memory of untaught days
When dawn and dark brought to the waiting soul
The vision that he sees now through the dusk
Leading him back to thy tranquility.
I saw last night again the Unknown Land,
And, travelled far, I stood beside a sea
Whose pale waves crowding stared head over head
And mouthed warning inarticulate.
Spirits of poets they, high called and lost,
Thus missing half the Man's eternity
For gaining half the Poet's, Joy forgone.
And there by the dread waste of liquid life
My feet were set upon a living shore
Wrought of the souls that never knew the Joy
And never needed, never lost, -- all dumb
But at long rest while the waves turn and toss.
These quiet I loved more than the quick foam,
And yet the human pity at my heart
Stirred and would draw me to that passionate shame,
But that the Joy flamed and the glorious phrase
Broke into rapture: the waves wept to hear,
Wept for the exaltation once their own,
Wept for the gold they never more may spend
In mintage of the phrase upon the Kind,
Wept, wept, to scatter from the spirit's tower
The joy-notes and the glory of this song.
I hastened thence to spare them cruelty
Out through the Ivory Gate,-- and thus I know
The dream was but a symbol of the true.
It is the Spring and these the songs of Spring,
Songs of the rathe rose and the lily's hope;--
For now the Poet hears the lily call
That came to Christ from beauty's natural shrine
And, through his lips, soared sacred out and up
Into the space beyond of holiness,
The aether of the rapture of High God.
Oh! it steals to us like the breath of dawn
That fills the pipes of Nature with sweet sounds,--
Steals low and swells anon into a chant
To throb and triumph through the heart of Spring
With the clear canticle of Love that hails
The orient Epiphany of Joy.
And now the poet heart is calling too
And called aloud by every voice divine
Behind our wall out through the lattices.
Now is the season of the Golden Joy,
Now is the season of the birth of Love--
The perfect passion of the heart of God,
The rapture of the beauty of the world,
The rapture of eternity of bliss!
For all our Winters pass and all rains go,
And all the flowers of Joy appear again,
And Spring is green with figs more beautiful
And sweet with odours of the mystic Tree
That droops its branches over Heaven and Earth,
Scattering flowers and fruit and passionate wine
Down into all the places of the sun,
And into all the nether places dim,
Fragrant with ecstasy of Joy and Peace.
And who will steep his senses in the flowers
And who will feed his spirit on the fruit
And who will his veins with the great wine
Shall see no Winters and shall feel no rains
But Joy perpetual in the Land of God.
poem by Thomas MacDonagh
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Three-Fold
Somewhere I've read a thoughtful mind's reflection:
'All perfect things are three-fold'; and I know
Our love has the rare symbol of perfection;
The brain's response, the warm blood's rapturous glow,
The soul's sweet language, silent and unspoken.
All these unite us with a deathless tie.
For when our frail, clay tenement is broken,
Our spirits will be lovers still, on high.
My dearest wish, you speak before I word it.
You understand the workings of heart.
My soul's thought, breathed where only God has heard it,
You fathom with your strange divining art.
And Like a fire, that cheers, and lights, and blesses,
And floods a mansion full of happy heat,
So does the subtle warmth of your caresses,
Pervade me with rapture, keen as sweet.
And so sometimes, as you and I together
Exult in all dear love's three-fold delights,
I cannot help but vaguely wonder whether
When our free souls attain their spirit heights,
E'en if we reach that upper realm where God is,
And find the tales of heavenly glory true,
I wonder if we shall not miss our bodies,
And long, at times, for hours on earth we knew.
As now, we sometimes pray to leave our prison
And soar beyond all physical demands,
So may we not sigh, when we have arisen,
For just one old-time touch of lips and hands?
I know, dear heart, a thought like this seems daring
Concerning God's vast Government above,
Yet, even There, I shrink from wholly sparing
One element, from this, our Three-fold Love.
poem by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
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A Woman's Complaint
I know that deep within your heart of hearts
You hold me shrined apart from common things,
And that my step, my voice, can bring to you
A gladness that no other pleasure brings.
And yet, dear love, through all the weary days
You never speak one word of tenderness,
Nor stroke my hair, nor softly clasp my hand
Within your own in loving mute caress.
You think, perhaps, I should be all content
To know so well the loving place I hold
Within your life, and so you do not dream
How much I long to hear the story told.
You cannot know, when we two sit alone,
And tranquil thoughts within your mind are stirred,
My heart is crying like a tire child
For one fond look, one gentle, loving word.
It may be when your eyes look into mine
You only say, 'How dear she is to me!'
Oh, could I read it in you softened glance.
How radiant this plain world would be!
Perhaps, sometimes, you breathe a secret prayer
That choicest blessings unto me be given;
But if you said aloud, 'God bless thee, dear!'
I should not ask a greater boon from Heaven.
I weary sometimes of the rugged way;
But should you say, 'Through thee my life is sweet,'
The dreariest desert that our path could cross
Would suddenly grow green beneath my feet.
'Tis not the boundless waters ocean holds
That give refreshment to the thirsty flowers,
But just the drops that, rising to the skies,
From thence descend in softly falling showers.
What matter that our granaries are filled
With all the richest harvest's golden stores,
If we who own them cannot enter in,
But famished stand before the close-barred doors?
And so 'tis sad that those who should be rich
In that true love that crowns our earthly lot,
Go praying with white lips from day to day
For love's sweet tokens, and receive them not.
poem by Anonymous Americas
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A New Year's Morning Song
Thanksgiving and the voice of melody,
This new year's morning, call me from my sleep;
A new, sweet song is in my heart for Thee,
Thou faithful, tender Shepherd of the sheep;
Thou knowest where to find, and how to keep
The feeble feet that tremble where they stray, —
O'er the dark mountains — through the whelming deep —
Thy everlasting mercy makes its way.
The past is not so dark as once it seemed,
For there Thy footprints, now distinct, I see;
And seed in weakness sown, from death redeemed,
Is springing up, and bearing fruit in Thee.
Not all that hath been, Lord, henceforth shall be;
A low, sweet, cheering strain is in mine ear,
Thanksgiving, and the voice of melody,
Are leading in, from Heaven, a blest new year.
With voice subdued, my listening spirit sings,
As backward on the trodden path I gaze,
While ministering angels fold their wings,
To fill with lowly thoughts my song of praise.
The shadow of the past on future days,
Will make them clear to my instructed sight;
For the heart's knowledge of Thy sacred ways,
Even in its deepest, darkest shades, is light.
I am not stronger — yet I do not fear
The present pain, the conflict yet to be;
Experience is a kind voice in mine ear,
And all my failures bid me lean on Thee.
No future suffering can seem strange to me,
While in the hidden part I feel and know
The wisdom of a child at rest and free
In the tried love, whose judgment keeps him low.
Thanksgiving and the voice of melody!
O, to my tranquil heart how sweet the strain!
Father of mercies, it arose in Thee,
And to Thy bosom it returns again.
There let my grateful song, my soul, remain,
Calm in the risen Savior's tender care;
And welcome any trial, any pain,
That serves to keep thy faithful children there.
Thoughts of Thy love — and O, how great the sum!
Enduring grief, obtaining bliss for me;
The world, life, death, things present, things to come,
All swell a new year's opening melody.
Past, present, future, all things worship Thee;
And I, through all, with trembling joy behold,
While mountains fall, and treacherous visions flee,
Thy wandering sheep returning to the fold.
poem by Anna Laetitia Waring
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Love Thyself Last
Love thyself last. Look near, behold thy duty
To those who walk beside thee down life’s road;
Make glad their days by little acts of beauty,
And help them bear the burden of earth’s load.
Love thyself last. Look far and find the stranger,
Who staggers ‘neath his sin and his despair;
Go lend a hand, and lead him out of danger,
To heights where he may see the world is fair.
Love thyself last. The vastnesses above thee
Are filled with Spirit Forces, strong and pure.
And fervently, these faithful friends shall love thee:
Keep thou thy watch o’er others, and endure.
Love thyself last; and oh, such joy shall thrill thee,
As never yet to selfish souls was given.
Whate’er thy lot, a perfect peace will fill thee,
And earth shall seem the ante-room of Heaven.
Love thyself last, and thou shall grow in spirit
To see, to hear, to know, and understand.
The message of the stars, lo, thou shall hear it,
And all God’s joys shall be at thy command.
poem by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
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To Mary in Heaven
I.
I met thee first in May, Mary!
The flower-crowned month of May;
But now thou art away, Mary!
Away from me—away!
Thou wert that all to me, Mary!
That all on earth to me,
That I will be to thee, Mary!
In Heaven above to thee.
II.
Ah! then thine eyes were mild, Mary!
Thy deep blue eyes were mild;
For thou wert then a child, Mary!
And I another child.
Thou wert that all to me, Mary!
That all on earth to me,
That I will be to thee, Mary!
In Heaven above to thee.
III.
Thy face was then so meek, Mary!
So saintly mild, so meek,
Thy lily-form seemed weak, Mary!
And mine for thine grew weak
For thou wert that to me, Mary!
That all on earth to me,
That I will be to thee, Mary!
In Heaven above to thee.
IV.
You led me through the meads, Mary!
The flower-enameled meads,
By brooks of rustling reeds, Mary!
By brooks of rustling reeds—
Where thou wert that to me, Mary!
That all on earth to me,
That I will be to thee, Mary!
In Heaven above to thee.
V.
Wherever you then went, Mary!
No matter where you went—
I followed with content, Mary!
Because you were content.
For thou wert that to me, Mary!
That all on earth to me,
That I will be to thee, Mary!
In Heaven above to thee.
VI.
I recollect the morn, Mary!
The beautiful May-Morn,
Beside the Field of Corn, Mary!
The rustling reeds of Corn—
That thou wert that to me, Mary!
That all on earth to me,
That I will be to thee, Mary!
In Heaven above to thee.
VII.
Ah! then I took thy hand, Mary!
Thy lily snow-white hand;
And walked along the sand, Mary!
The milk-white road of sand.
For thou wert that to me, Mary!
That all on earth to me,
That I will be to thee, Mary!
In Heaven above to thee.
VIII.
I caught thee round the waist, Mary!
The slender Sylph-like waist,
And felt my heart beat fast, Mary!
Because thine own beat fast.
For thou wert that to me, Mary!
That all on earth to me,
That I will be to thee, Mary!
In Heaven above to thee.
IX.
Such words fell from thy tongue, Mary!
Such sweet words from thy tongue,
That when you talked you sung, Mary!
You never talked but sung.
Then thou wert that to me, Mary!
That all on earth to me,
That I will be to thee, Mary!
In Heaven above to thee.
X.
Thus through the month of May, Mary!
The flower-crowned month of May,
We, courting, went to play, Mary!
And courted in our play.
The years were then to me, Mary!
As hours are now to me;
As time is now to thee, Mary!
In Heaven above to thee.
XI.
For Love knows nought of years, Mary!
Love nothing knows of years;
And sheds no bitter tears, Mary!
Time measured is by tears.
Thus thou wert that to me, Mary!
That all on earth to me,
That I will be to thee, Mary!
In Heaven above to thee.
XII.
What thou art now above, Mary!
I was, as if above;
For Heaven is made of love, Mary!
And I was full of love.
For thou wert that to me, Mary!
That all on earth to me,
That I will be to thee, Mary!
In Heaven above to thee.
XIII.
But now these days are gone, Mary!
These halcyon days are gone!
And I am left alone, Mary!
Alone on earth-- alone!
What would I give to see, Mary!
Thy precious form to see?
All thou wouldst give to be, Mary!
In this dark world with me.
poem by Thomas Holley Chivers from Eonchs of Ruby (1851)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Woman of God
Deep in the crevices we touch life
Down and down into a sea of gold
Woven in stars from grand eons
We are a dream from the throne
Music plays from mystic trees
Fruit bright with living light
Saturn shines like a lovers caress
Rivers sigh with whispering night
She is a well from a deep river
Streams of peace flow from above
Thirsty hearts drink pure water
Lilies of the field tenderly love
Visions blend with daily eternity
Joy radiates with a pure blue glow
Unity the treasure of redemption
Past the past we struggle and grow
Touch the very hem of beauty
She brings the kiss of temporal time
Price above rubies, virtue and warmth
Light a fire with the torch of moonlight
Groaning deep in agony of soul
Temporary love becomes worldly lust
A kingdom not made by hands of man
Do you reach for love past this dust?
This mortal coil is filled with despair
Thorns and thistle on a bed of time
Hope must be in the permanent realm
Dying flowers lose their summer light
I seek essence in your sky above
Paths born in the eternal spring
Touch me with life that never ends
Let me hear the bright angels sing
A Woman of God shines for evermore
poem by Joseph Narusiewicz
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