Hymns and Poems :: :: University of Virginia Library

Far down within the castle of the soul
Exists from ancient days a postern door,
Opening upon th' abyss where ceaseless roll
Time's silent surges on th' eternal shore,—
A secret portal, which to-day self-closed
Perchance to-morrow morn is open found;
According as the thoughts have been disposed,
Or momentary sight, or scent, or sound,
Or breath divine may have its magic bars unbound.

Thither one night by spiral stair descending,
Within the central keep of my own mind,
Flight below flight—so far, it seem'd unending—
I went, absorb'd in thoughts of solemn kind;
As through some ancient mine one all alone
With his pale fitful light exploring goes;
And starts to hear or weirdly whispering tone,
Or rush of water as unseen it flows,
Or other wandering sound for which no cause he knows.

At length I came upon a lonely cell,
That like a timeworn hermitage appear'd,
Scoop'd midway in a cliff impregnable
Of basalt rock.—A heap of leaflets, sear'd
By Autumn's touch, the vagrant winds had piled
Upon the floor; and in the wall was seen
A niche, where meekly folding her dread Child
Stood the blest Mother, of Archangels Queen,
Carved in the living rock, with a most loving mien.

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Half open stood the door; I push'd it wide.—
Ah, me, what sight was there! the dense profound
Of sheer infinity's abysmal void
Broke sudden from the threshold. Not a sound
Stirr'd the strange blank; nor dark it seem'd, nor light;
But a great nameless all-absorbing deep,
Upon whose verge I shiver'd with affright,
As the fledged eaglet, balancing to sweep
Downward on his first plunge from the stern dizzy steep.

Ah, then had I extinct in darkness been,
Lost in the depths of that abyss unknown,
But that a hand behind me came unseen,
And pluck'd me back when I was all but gone.
Breathless before the Mother and the Child
A moment and I seem'd to kneel and pray;
A moment and methought their faces smiled,
As if they had some gracious thing to say:
Then sudden from my dream I woke,—and it was day!

I woke; but still the thought of that abyss
Haunted my spirit with a fearful power;
And long in vain I struggled to dismiss
Its memory through many a waking hour.
O bountiful compassion of the Lord!
Thus warning us by day and night in turn;
Forcing by fear, enticing by reward;
That man may his mortality discern,
And from his nothingness his true dependence learn

O Nothingness, from whence my being sprang;
O Nothingness, to which again I tend;
If Thou, who didst the globe on nothing hang,
Refuse Thine ever-present aid to lend!
Essential Being, whence all beings flow,
Teach me my native misery to see;
Teach me my perfect nullity to know;

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Teach me to feel how I depend on Thee
For all I was, or am, or may hereafter be.

And thou, pure Virgin Daughter of the sky,
Who, fashion'd like myself in mortal mould,
Wast raised by thy deep lowliness so high
As in thine arms Creation's Lord to hold,
Entreat for me that I aside may cast
All things that might my heavenward course impede;
That I may humbly walk, and gain at last,
From all temptation, sin, and suffering freed,
The bosom of my God, whence endless joys proceed.