The Poems of A. C. Benson

Old craftsmen of the Galilean lake,
Seems it not strange to you all day to stand
In these high minster windows, looking down
Upon uplifted faces, folded palms?
Each in his niche of costly carven work,
Crocket and spire and finial overhead,
And underfoot such radiant stones as those
Ye dreamed of, when your pure uplifted thought,
Withdrawn a moment from the raging world
That God makes fair and men make horrible,
Took shape in bright imaginings, and traced
The pearly city, paved with limpid gold,
Foursquare, mysterious.

Seems it strange to you
To feel the high sun beat and stream at noon
Through your ensanguined vesture, through the hands
Once rough with spray and cordage, now at length
White as some dainty scholar's, wan and thin
With long seclusion, while the altered ray,
Through curious gems and holy aureoles,
Paints hues of Paradise on sculptured stone?

Or when the organ rises, growing bold,
With all his crowded trumpets, soaring flutes,
Grave mellow diapasons, gushing out
With such a flood of sound, the leaden bands
That bind you, throb in shattering ecstasy,
What wonder if you dream that peace on earth
Grows perfect, and your kingdom comes indeed?

Start ye to hear, in soft mellifluous tones,
When all the throng is hushed, the words ye said
In ignorance, before ye yet were wise,
The childish question, the uncertain claim,
The tale of all your desperate treachery,
(Before the Spirit flamed above your brows,)
When love and adoration were too weak
To meet the stern set look of scribes and priests,
The unclean jests of riotous legionaries,
And the long gleaming of those Roman spears?

Or when the hush is deepest, and you hear
The fiery speech of the forerunner, John,
John the wild hermit, the unquiet heart
Who cried and yearned and was unsatisfied,
And then the mild majestic voice of Him
Who was your Master first, and then your God,
(Too late for hope, but not too late for faith,)
And memory deepens till you almost see
The rolling wilderness, with ridge and vale,
Run to the Northern heights, the Mount, the streets
Of white Capernaum, and the boat that swayed

Upon the swelling of the azure tide,
While He yet spake; and evermore the ring
Of wondering faces, waiting to be fed.

And do ye smile in sweet austerity
To hear yourselves extolled, your faltering faith,
Your weak endeavourings to pierce beyond
The night, the stars, the little labouring world,
To that high throne so infinitely far;
When the pale preacher waxing eloquent
Would make you demigods, not patient men
Who wept, and wondered, and but half believed?

Then, when the lordly crowd streams out, to join
The merry world, and shoulder welcome cares,
And the mute handful of enraptured souls
Bend low in utter prayer, or gather round
To hear the words ye heard in Zion once,
In that bare upper room, when secret dread
O'ershadowed all the board, ere yet the night
Fell, and the stammering traitor crept apart
Too dark at heart to join the vesper hymn;
When bread and wine, too high for angels' food,
In paten rich and sacred chalice gleam,
Till veiled in secret snowy linen, stands
The unfinished feast, too sacred to behold,
Unlike the fragments of the meat divine,
Called in an instant from the winds of heaven,
Ye stored in sorry baskets, so to stay
Your hunger in the inhospitable wild.—
Say, is it strange? The world is full of woe,

Sharp torments, drear bewildering agonies,
Yet full of sweet surprises, sins forgiven,
And hopes fulfilled beyond the reach of hope.

And He that in your midst is lifted up,
Branded and buffeted and crowned with scorn,
Looks with clear eyes beyond the low-hung mist
We move in, reads the secret of the stars,
Asks of the Father, and is not denied
The knowledge not allowed to restless brains,
The eternal cause, the all-sufficing end.

University of Virginia Library

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