 | Poems by Julia C. R. Dorr |  |
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THE PLACE
“I GO TO PREPARE A PLACE FOR YOU”
I.
O Holy Place, we know not where thou art!Though one by one our well-beloved dead
From our close claspings to thy bliss have fled,
They send no word back to the breaking heart;
And if, perchance, their angels fly athwart
The silent reaches of the abyss wide-spread,
The swift white-wings we see not, but instead
Only the dark void keeping us apart.
Where did he set thee, O thou Holy Place?
Made he a new world in the heavens high hung,
So far from this poor earth that even yet
Its first glad rays have traversed not the space
That lies between us, nor their glory flung
On the old home its sons can ne'er forget?
II.
But what if on some fair, auspicious night,Like that on which the shepherds watched of old,
Down from far skies, in burning splendor rolled,
Shall stream the radiance of a star more bright
Than ever yet hath shone on mortal sight—
Swift shafts of light, like javelins of gold,
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From zone to zenith flooding all the height?
And what if, moved by some strange inner sense,
Some instinct, than pure reason wiser far,
Some swift clairvoyance that annulleth space,
All men shall cry, with sudden joy intense,
“Behold, behold this new resplendent star—
Our heaven at last revealed!—the Place! the Place!”
III.
Then shall the heavenly host with one accordVeil their bright faces in obeisance meet,
While swift they haste the Glorious One to greet.
Then shall Orion own at last his Lord,
And from his belt unloose the blazing sword,
While pale proud Ashtaroth with footsteps fleet,
Her jewelled crown drops humbly at his feet,
And Lyra strikes her harp's most rapturous chord.
O Earth, bid all your lonely isles rejoice!
Break into singing, all ye silent hills;
And ye, tumultuous seas, make quick reply!
Let the remotest desert find a voice!
The whole creation to its centre thrills,
For the new light of Heaven is in the sky!
| Poems by Julia C. R. Dorr | |