Poems :: :: University of Virginia Library

TO A FRIEND AND COUNTRYWOMAN WHO HAS “THE VOICE OF THE CHARMER” TO KATHARINE TYNAN HINKSON

Etáin the Queen

An Old Irish Story

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In the days when Julius Cæsar ruled the world beyond the eastern seas, the Milesians kinged it in Eirin, and the great Tuatha de Danaan, who for so long had reigned there, were in the world of the unseen ones, dwelling in stately palaces underneath the earth, fairer than any dwellings that were upon her breast. They were gods, and in their light and radiance they had conquered the Fomorians, the gods of night and darkness: and in their turn the de Danaan were conquered by the wonderful sons of Mile, who had spied the Western Island from their Great Plain, and had come over and won to the taking and the holding of it. Now Mider of the de Danaan, who dwelt in the palace of Bregleith, had a very fair wife whose name was Etáin. And she was carried away from him and set in a beautiful dwelling by his foster-son, Oengus: And Mider lamented her sore. And through evil jealousies and hardnesses Etáin was swept away, and whirled by a wind of violent blowing into the land of Ultonia. There did strange things befall her, and it came to pass that, lo! Etáin the goddess was born anew of a mortal mother, and her old life dropt away from her, and all was with her as if that old life had never been. So it was that Etáin grew to be the fairest of all the fairest women of Eirin, and the Ard-Righ, that is to say the High-King of Eirin, Eochaid Airem, loved her and took her to wife, and she dwelt with him at Tara in love and spousehead:

Mider of Bregleith loved Etáin with a love undying as the gods themselves, and he came to the Queen at Tara, when the High-King was not there, and he put her in mind of the days when he had been husband to her in the world of the gods. But the love of earth and the fairness thereof were about the eyes and the soul of Etáin, and the world of the gods was to her as nought, and she would not go with Mider to his palace at Bregleith.

I see with the eye of my mind where a lady sitteth,
A lady sweet in her youth, and as fair as dawn;
I would kneel to kiss her hand, as it well befitteth
For she is the High-King's wife, the Queen Etáin.

And I see that, a little apart, in a glory tender,
A stranger stands, from the head to the feet all bright;
A stranger, of grace no painter's brush could render,
Nor song-sweet lips of sweetest poet recite.

Will she sit for ever, with head poised calm and steady?
Doth not her heart beat fast in a presence like this?
Should not thy cheek grow pale or red, O lady,
Waiting to hear if he brings thee bale or bliss?

Hark, he speaketh, and calleth the Queen by her name!
Lo, she turneth, but not as in pride or in shame,
Looketh serene on the guest with her star-clear eyes,
That have never a matron's fear or a maid's surprise.

Hark, he singeth, and now, by his voice, I know
Mider the god, who had loved her long ago;
Mider she loved, and Mider she loveth not;
Loved in the deathless life, in the mortal life forgot.

Mider
sings:

Come, my beloved, come!
Child of the great de Danaan strain,
Etáin, come to thine own again.
Thee, in the glorious day of yore,
No mortal got, no mortal bore:
Thy people dwell in palaces
Below the earth, more fair than these
Which Mile's sons in pride erect,
And with their cunning hands have deckt
In all device of pleasant things
That know the call of mortal kings;
Things that delight the ear and eye
With sound and colour and symmetry.
But we, who are the immortal ones,
Need not the light of moons or suns,
We being light itself, and so
Bringers of light where'er we go.
Come, O beloved, come!

We need not craft of smiths to make
Fair things and noble, for we take
Beauty itself along with us,
In high perfection glorious.
Come back to us, Etáin, Etáin,
Come to the day that has no dawn,
The day whose beauty never knows
The mournful splendour of a close.
Come, O beloved, come!

Etáin
I know thee not, O Bright One, who thou art.
Why dost thou come to me, the High-King's love?
Is thy name Death, and art thou come indeed
To tell me I must go from my beloved,
Into a strange dim country, where the skies
Droop low, with never a light of star, but vague
Soft twilight, full of little sounds and thin,
And not the red cock's voice can lift a shout,
But all is hush? I heard a cuckoo cry
Last night i' the dark; he cried three little cries,
And then I counted sixteen times, but all
Were muffled in the darkness; and I rose
An-hungered for the dawn; and then he cried
Loud-voiced and strong. Oh, let me hear my birds
I' the sunshine, not i' the dark, and smell my flowers
New-scented from its kiss, and sing my songs
With Eochaid's love happed warm about my breast.

Mider
Not so, dear heart, I am not Death, but Love.
I come of glorious strain; thou wert mine own
And art, and shalt be evermore mine own,
And I am thine, and in this love is all
Possession of beauty and joy and everything
That bringeth gladness home from day to day,
The delicate day whose light, nor keen nor fierce,
Can never fade into the grey of even,
Nor glow into the blinding splendour of noon.
Etáin, I am thy love, and thou art mine.
Etáin, I call thee not to death, but life.

Etáin
I know thee not, O Bright One.

Mider
Me thou knew'st
Full well in that old bliss whose name was love:

Etáin
Nay, nay, if ever there was such a bliss,
'Tis gone for evermore and evermore:
Come thou not hither from a vanished past
To me who live within a blessed now.

Mider
There is no past in immortality.
Thou art my love who wast, shalt be my love
For evermore and evermore my love.
Thy mortal lover will wax old and droop;
His hair grow sparse and grey; his eyes be dim;
His bell-voice break to piping querulous-weak;
His limbs that touch the heather, light as air,
Fail, totter, till they stop for the long rest
In earth-bed, yawning wide to take them in.
While thou, Etáin, shalt know no touch of eld,
Safe in my love which has the dew of youth,
Never dried up by time. O sweet, my sweet,
How can a mortal love thee like to me?

Etáin

Thy love is no more to me
Than a fluffy cloud that melts
At the smiling of the sun:
Thy love is no more to me
Than insect-piping, lost
In the laughter of the wind:
I know thee not: thou hast

No strain that I should know;
And who begat thy sires
I know not, care no whit.
The High-King is my mate;
I change him not for thee.

My love hath splendour and beauty that pass the telling,
Splendour and beauty of grace and of noble deed;
Lips of him never the place for a light lie's dwelling;
Brow of him girt with the sheen of the conqueror's meed.

What be god-sire and dame to me whose love is a mortal?
Mortal father and mother begat him and bare;
Mortal is he, and with him I go through the portal
That opens a strange dim dwelling, I know not where;
Only where he is, there I, come foul, come fair.

I see him smile on the lady he looks upon,
With the smile of a deathless god, and he turns, and is gone.

'Tis Eochaid the King, and he sitteth at Tara in kingly wise;
And calm from the height of the fortress he sweepeth the plain with his eyes;
He seeth how fertile the land where the oats and the barley are swayed
By the delicate wind of the west, that stirreth, nor maketh afraid;
He seeth the strength of the oak, and the grace of the birch, and the gleam

Of the water that runneth apace where the meadows slope down to the stream;
Content is the sight of his eyes, and the heart in his bosom is fain,
And earth is the place of his pleasure, unwitting of sorrow and pain.
And the noblest and sweetest of all the gifts that are laid on his life
Is the Lady Etáin, whom the bosom of Eirin has given him to wife.
But, lo, as he looketh, he seeth a warrior draw nigh to the hold,
And nought of his face or his frame, or his going, could Eochaid have told.
Oh, purple the hue of his tunic, the hair of him yellow as gold,
And his eyes from the depth of their blue send light that is great to behold.
He carries a five-pointed lance, and a shield with a gold-bossèd rim;
And Eochaid, albeit he knoweth him not, giveth welcome to him.

Mider

I know thee, O King Eochaid, who thou art,
Yea, and have known thee from the days of old.
Mider of Bregleith is the name I bear,
And I am come to play the chess with thee.

Then Eochaid is well content, for he knows how the land is filled
With his fame beyond all the rest who are good at the chess and skilled.

Eochaid
Right glad am I to play the chess with thee.
But Queen Etáin, my wife, is sleeping now
Within the chamber where I have my chess.

Mider

Nay, Eochaid, nay, High-King, that matters not,
Because I bear mine own chess here with me,
And not less fine and beautiful than thine.

True is the word, for the board is brightest silver sheer,
At every corner set with the sheen of jewels clear;
And the bag of shining wire is marvel to behold,
And the men he draws thereforth are all of the beaten gold:

Mider
Say, High-King of Eirin, say what shall be the stake?
What shall the loser give, and what shall the winner take?

Eochaid
Thou, O Mider of Bregleith, choice at thy will shalt make.

Mider
King, if thou win, thou shalt have fifty bay horse high-kinned,
Deep in the chest, and slender of hoof, and swift as the wind.

Eochaid

And, lo, if I lose, thou shalt have whate'er thy desire may be.

(For he thinks in his heart, there is none to be victor over me.)

And the High-King loseth, and Mider the god he hath the victory.

So Eochaid speaketh to Mider to tell him the heart-wished thing:
And Mider asketh Etáin, the wife of Eochaid the king.
But the High-King claimeth of Mider another game to play;
And if Mider prove the winner, Etáin shall be his that day;
And before that game be played, a twelvemonth shall pass away.

So Mider goes forth, and Eochaid sees him no more that year;
But he comes full oft to Etáin, and makes himself sweet to her;
And he sings with the voice of a god in melody fair and low,
And he bids her to rise from earth and forth in his love to go.

Mider

Etáin, Etáin, come back to me;
Resume thine immortality.
Come back to youth perpetual,
Years that have neither spring nor fall,
But in sweet music pass away;
Years that are all one lovely day.

Come where Death never sets a foot,
Where lips for grief are never mute,
Where there is never a woe to feel,
Where there is never a wound to heal.
Oh, life and light and bliss for thee!
Come, O beloved, come with me!

But the life of the gods is gone, and their bliss from the lady all,
And the voice of Mider is weak from the life of men to call;
For now is she wholly and merely a lady of mortal birth,
Who loves, and who loves none other save only her spouse of earth;
And never a ray of remembrance she keeps for the deathless ones,
For she lives, a daughter of Eirin, with Eirin's daughters and sons.
But at last she speaks to the god, and weariful speaketh she,
If Eochaid shall bid me forth from Tara to go with thee
Then forth from Eochaid and Tara with thee I promise to go.

For she thinks in her heart of hearts that never it can be so.

King Eochaid waiteth in grief and goeth all tremblingly
In the black, black shadow of fear, to see the year go by;

And he kisseth Etáin in the shadow, and joy is smitten with blight,
And his heart is anguished sore, and quenched is the dear delight.

Etáin

Dearest, our loves were lovely fair,
Blest beyond thought or dream we were.
Oh, mine own one, what is this?
What the shadow that darks our bliss?
Shadow of fear that striketh numb—
He who divideth our loves will come.

Love, my king, my love, he told
Of a land wherein none groweth old;
Where the locks are crowned with flowers of spring;
And the body is white, and everything
Is comely of shape, and fair of hue—
But, O my lover, leal and true,
More should I love the silver streaks
Among your locks, and your faded cheeks,
And your eyes that had known the dew of tears,
And your heart made rich with the joy of years.
Better to me were these than all
The glory of gods' high festival.

The year goes by, and Mider to Tara cometh once more;
To challenge the King to play; and when the game is o'er

The winner shall have his will, and the stake he choose be paid,
And this be the end of the thing, the one last game to be played.

The game is lost, the game is won;
The game is over and done.

Eochaid
O winner, say what thou art fain to have.

Mider
Fain would I put mine arms around Etáin;
Fain would I lay my kiss upon her mouth.

Eochaid

Give me one little moon of tarrying;
Then, O god Mider, thou shalt have thy will.

The day they have set is come, and Eochaid abides in his hall,
At Tara, his palace high, and great knights stout and tall
Are serried thick round him and his wife Etáin for guard,
And strong ones are standing outside the gates at watch and ward,
Lest stranger foot may enter, the gates are locked and barred.

They watch all day, but never a stranger foot draws near,
And close to her husband's side is Etáin the fair and dear.

They watch till the shadows fall and the coming of night is nigh,
Lest he, divider of loves, should come to them suddenly.
But, lo, the shadows flee, though the ruling of night is there,
For the presence of Mider who stands in his beauty godhead-fair;
And the hall is as light as though the strong sun shining were.
And Mider speaks to the King, and thus for Etáin asks he,
For, lo, he saith, thou didst promise to give Etáin to me:
The red flush takes her cheeks, upgoes to her forehead's snow—

Etáin
Ne'er will I go with thee, till Eochaid bids me go.

Eochaid

Never, oh, never, Etáin, shall this thing be.
Yet suffer him to take thee in his arms,
And kiss thee on the mouth before us all.
For this, my wife, I surely promised him,
And 'tis mine honour that I should not lie.

Then Mider shifteth his lance from his left hand to his right,
And he lifteth Etáin in his arms, and up from the floor in their sight,
And out through the great roof-hole of the King's high hall they have past,
And a great shame falls on the men, and they mightily stir aghast;

In wrath they rush from the hall, but nothing avails their wrath,
For they see two swans o'erhead, that fly on the high wind's path,
Two swans that, in lovely flight, are wondrous to behold,
And each on the fair long neck is wearing a yoke of gold.

This is a story that kings have heard recited and sung:
For poets had honour and praise of kings when the world was young.

Amairgen

Amairgen the White-kneed sang,
And his song was great and sweet,
For the heart within him beat
In tune with the heart of the world.

Amairgen the White-kneed sang;
I am the Wave of the Sea,
And the murmur of Ocean free,
And the Bull of the Seven Fights.

Amairgen the White-kneed sang;
I am a Tear of the Sun,
And of Plants the fairest one,
And the Vulture upon the rock.

Amairgen the White-kneed sang;
I am the Boar of the woods,
And the Salmon that leaps the floods,
And the Lake in the plains am I.

Amairgen the White-kneed lives
In the heart of things that are;
But his children moan afar
From his light, and count him dead.

He knew, and was, and is:
But his kinsfolk will not see
The heart of the world as he,
Amairgen, the singer of yore.

The Ballad of the Judas Tree

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(Qui ad perditionem animarum pervagantur in mundo)

The blossom is on the Judas Tree,
Rosed-white bells all fair to see.
What are they chiming mystically,
Those little bells so sweet and free?
What are they tolling heavily,
In a grim and drear monotony?
How is it now with thee and thee,
Woman and man by the Judas Tree?
Woman and man, be swift to flee
From the rosed-white bloom of the Judas Tree.

(But they pluck the flowers of the Judas Tree.)

The leafage is on the Judas Tree,
Clasping the blossom verdantly.
Man and woman, for thee and thee,
Not I but the truth of God in me,
Lift a voice to bid you flee
From the blossom and leaf of the Judas Tree:

(But they gather the leaves of the Judas Tree.)

The fruitage is on the Judas Tree,
Purple glooming in deadly blee.
Oh, if ye pluck that ill berry,
Pluck the fruit of the Judas Tree,
Never again for thee and thee,
Woman and man, shall joyaunce be:

(But they eat the fruit of the Judas Tree.)

Sun, rain, and dews, 'twas never ye
That nurtured the deadly Judas Tree!
Never these gracious things to see
Never the fair earth's sweetness free
Nurtured the deadly Judas Tree!

Oh, the life of the Judas Tree
An ill spirit fed mortally.
(He once was incarnate treachery.)
He burrowed beneath the Judas Tree,
And rose with the sap of the Judas Tree,
Each bough and twiglet entered he,
And laughed a-low in his deathly glee.

Was this the curse of the Judas Tree?
God He knoweth for thee and thee,
How your two souls walked the way that he
Showed the world in Gethsemane,
With the greeting and kiss of treachery.

Ye two knelt on bended knee
Where the Light of Light shines veiledly;
Ye two vowed sweet vows to be
Children of Light for eternity;
Oh, what is this for thee and thee,
What was your sin by the Judas Tree?

Not the sin of the leaping free
Of hearts high beating passionately;
Not the sin of the pride and glee
Of the giver-soul that comes to be
Betrayed by its generosity;
But the deadly thing that chillingly

Pierced to the marrow of thee and thee
With its dart of utter falsity.
Oh, poor souls, poor souls who dree
The woes than which none heavier be,
Deaf ears and eyes that cannot see.

Out of God's grace ye went to be
Guests at His foes' base revelry;
Clasping the low things sordidly,
The low things lighter than vanity.
Thirty pieces of shining blee?
Nay, not a silverling to see!
Only the coinage false that we
Call the wages that devilry
Giveth its servants verily.

(But the wages of sin is death, said He.)

Was it the curse of the Judas Tree?
Was it thus, poor souls, for thee and thee,
Were ye wrapt in the strangling folds that be
Spun and woven in hell? Were ye
Drawn to your sin by the curse that he
Who once was incarnate treachery,
Brought from hell to the Judas Tree?

He whom ye sold for pelf was He
Before whose face one day shall flee
Sin and death for eternity;
He whom ye sold your Judge shall be.
What of His doom for thee and thee?

Yea, but the Judge of all is He
Who loved you both on His gibbet tree.

Haste to His infinite charity,
Clasp to His wounded feet, and flee
From Him to Him for your lives, that He
May take to His mercy thee and thee.

The winter shall kill the Judas Tree,
When Christ on those looks mercifully
Who have known the bloom of the Judas Tree,
Who have sinned with the leaves of the Judas Tree,
Who were drugged with the juice of its mirk berry,
Who sinned their sin with the Judas Tree.
God's frost shall kill the Judas Tree,
The frost that burns eternally.

Happy-go-lucky

Happy-go-lucky, you darling, and is it yourself come at last?
We thought how the spring was delaying, the winter would never be past!
But Happy-go-lucky is here, and with her the breathing of spring,
And the earth has awoken from sleep, and the birds are beginning to sing.

Oh, God made the sun for the day, and God made the moon for the night,
And God has made Happy-go-lucky to give us dear joyaunce and light—
It's Happy-go-lucky they call you because you are always content
As to whether the guineas are coming, or whether the guineas are spent.

It's Happy-go-lucky they call you because they are sure you can do
With an outside unhandsome if only the inside be lovely and true:
For, under the tarnished and ugly, and under the sordid and mean,
You see with the eyes of the spirit the fair and the good and the clean.

The hour that I looked on you first, my beautiful lady, you trod
With sweet, serene joy of a soul just fresh from the blessing of God,

As you left the old priest and drew nigh to the shrine of the Heart of the Lord,
And you knelt, and I knelt, in the silence, and loved Him, and praised, and adored:

The next time I saw you, my dear, you were dancing. O young and O sweet,
And O happy, the joy of your heart was the rippling delight of your feet;
Your body made loveliest rhythm, gold-girdled, pearl-necklaced, white-clad;—
And the next time I saw you, you sat by a sick-bed your presence made glad.

You loosened your tongue's dearest music, and, oh! to that music there clung
A taste of the brogue that was making your English so sweet on the tongue:
Your words were the exquisite garb of your exquisite feeling and thought,
And the hospital ward was an Eden where sorrow and pain were as nought.

Right glad be our hearts and rejoicing because of His goodness who chose
This garden of ours to make lovely with odour and bloom of a rose,
This rose of His Paradise earthly, in beauty exceedingly fair,
Which Mary has nurtured for Jesus, and one day will give Him to wear.

Eld to Youth

Would I exchange
With you, my sweet,
For the clear eye's range,
And the rapid feet,
And the heart's high beat;

The white brow smooth,
And the cheek's warm rose,
The lips of youth,
And the lovely glows
That morning knows?

Exchange for these
The furrowed brow,
And the feeble knees,
And the hair's thin snow,
And the voice brought low;

The eye's eclipse,
And the hand that shakes,
The shaming slips
That memory makes;
And the sevenfold aches?

Not I, not I,
O young, O fair,
Who stand so nigh
To the river where
The soul strips bare.

But I may not speak
To tell you why,
O smooth of cheek,
O bright of eye.
Till the day I die.

(Have you not heard
Of the dear white stone
With its written word
By one soul known,
And her Lord alone?)

Ox-eyed Daisies

O bonny things that ne'er have toiled nor spun,
Yet go arrayed in gold-and-argent glow,
With the mind's eye methinks I see you grow
In the low-lying land where waters run,
So thick, the grass is well-nigh hid; and none
Of all your goodly host in gallant show
But bends a happy face where, westering low,
Shines the imperial beauty of the sun.

A message from the fields is come with you;
Clasp of the wholesome earth, joy of the light,
And fragrance of the rest which is of night,
Whisper and call of wind, and balm of dew;
All sweet-strong influence wherefrom ye grew;
And breathings even of the Infinite.

On Malvern Hills

“Thou mightest better mete the mist on Malvern hills—” (Prologue to Vision of Piers the Plowman)

Easier measure the mist on Malvern hills
Than—never mind what, in the saying of dour Long Will's—
Is it measureless, measureless mist on Malvern hills?

But, oh, can you measure the sunshine on Malvern hills,
The sunshine, the wonderful sunshine, on Malvern hills?
Man, do you measure life by its joys or its ills?
Judge by the mist or the sunshine upon the hills?
Is it measureless mist or sunshine your heart that fills?
The mist that will flee away with its mirk and its chills—
Or the sunshine eternal of God's eternal hills?

Of a Child who would not learn the Cris-cross Row

Father
Little child of mine, come hither to my knee:
Bring thine absey-book, and lightly learn of me.

Child
Nay, my father, nay, my father, I refuse,
For the early sun is diamonding the dews;
And I learn a better lesson as I look
On the fair world than from any absey-book.

Father
Dear, the lessons that my little one may win
From the world, and all the loveliness therein,
Shall be million-fold more worthful if he know
How to use the key that's in the cris-cross row.

Child
Father, take away the book, and let me lie
Where the high trees rear their glory 'gainst the sky,
And the birds sing loud upon the boughs that sway
Underneath their little darling feet alway.
There's a bird in me, O father mine, that calls
To its comrade-birds outside the school-room walls
And my heart is fain to hear the birds' reply
Bidding come away and sing in company.

Father

Yea, my bonny one, the bonny bird in thee
Shall outspread his wings indeed and carol free;
Only for the love thy father bears thee, get
First by heart the daily lesson he will set.

But the child's heart beat impatiently and fast,
And he flung away the absey-book at last;
And he fled to hear the fair birds carolling,
And he recked not of the cris-cross row a thing.

Oh, the long days grew from hours, the months from days,
And the long years grew from months, in Time's old ways;
And the birds and winds alike had ceased to bring
To the child's heart sweet incitement, comforting:
For his soul had grown beyond the soul of bird,
And well he knew that he had sorely erred.
Then he wept and cried a loud and bitter cry,
For his soul was vexed in him exceedingly.
There the book of life before him open lay,
And with awful tears he gazed and turned away,
For he could not read the text so fair and true:
Little strokes and curves and dots were all he knew.
And he thought how, in the old time, mad and blind,
He had cribbed his soul, and cabined and confined.
I think his heart with shame and anguish broke—
Then the morning touched mine eyelids, and I woke.

Monstra te esse Matrem

O mary mother, pray for one
With whom our souls had union!
Mother of pity and grace thou art,
So let the pity of thy dear heart
Go out for one who suffered much,
And show thyself the Mother. Such
As he are surely born to know
The ultimate of joy and woe:
Open to breathe at every pore,
No influence could he ignore
Of wind and mountain, sea and sky,
And man's delight and agony.
God's voice through all his being rang,
And the Foe's call, and the World's clang,
And self and love found battlefield,
Nor quite to win, nor quite to yield.

O Mary, Mother dear! he fed
His life sometimes at the Spring-head
Of life, and yet sometimes he chewed
The swine's poor husks for God's own food.
O Mother! he God meant to soar
On eagle wing dropt low and lower
The stately pinions of desire
That bore him high ofttimes, yea, higher
Than souls in painful toil that climb
God's mount of purity sublime.

Mother, dear Mother, if he sinned,
He never cloaked his fault or thinned

His blame, and surely did not wait
The passage through the deathly gate
To suffer. All that exquisite
Power of delight contained in it
Power of great anguish to chastise
The dear delight. How otherwise?

And well thou knowest how he took
Upon his soul the sore rebuke,
The bitter wrong, the anguish grim,—
O Mary, Mary, pray for him—
We dare to say it, Mother! he
Shouldered the Cross of Calvary
In the world's agony and shame,
And sin and ill that bears no name.
He saw God's little children sweet
Trampled beneath the devils' feet:
He heard the inarticulate cry
Of women bound in slavery:
He saw through bitter blinding tears
The sorrow of the mortal years:
He mourned for loss, and pain, and need:
O Mother sweet, he loved indeed.

Dear Mother, by the Holy Ghost
Made Mother, well we know thou know'st!
Say this to Jesus. Yes, we say
It all to Him, and ever pray
His mercy and His peace and light,
And sweet refreshment infinite;
But prayers of ours are soiled and dim,
So Mary, Mary, pray for him!

Thou who art love and purity,
The Lord being evermore with thee,
Thou above men and women blest,
O purest one, O tenderest,
Pray for this soul Thou knowest all
We fain would say, as here we fall
And kiss thy sacred feet which trod
The way to Calvary with God.
His name is on thy heart. We wait,
Kneeling before the mercy gate.

In the Day of Understanding

In the day of understanding,
Shall we know,
We who grieved each other so,
All the wherefore, all the why,
You and I?

In the day of understanding,
Shall we see,
Eyes enlightened perfectly,
How it was that heart and heart
Went apart?

In the day of understanding,
Shall we say,
Each to each, O Love, to-day
Do I love you, love you, more
Than of yore?

Our Lady's Birthday

The joy of the world is rising from out love's infinite sea;
The joy of the dead and the living, and the myriads yet to be.

For here is the vision of bliss and the splendour is here of the word
The eye of the seer hath seen and the ear of the hearer hath heard.

And the Temple new is here that shall know the quenchless might
Of the lost, restored Shekinah, the sheen of the Light of Light.

The Shrine of the Word Eternal, the House that is golden piled,
Is here in the swathing bands of a little new-born child;

A child who will sport with her fellows, and laugh and play unafraid,
As erst, before the Almighty, the Wisdom Eternal played.

Oh, she will look on the world of His love with open eyes,
And her open ears will catch the sound of its harmonies.

She will need to ask no secrets of the hidden, above, below,
Herself the secret of God, which He giveth for men to know.

In His temple blest she will love and work and, it may be, pray,
That the Lady who bears the Christ her eyes may see one day;

That she, in the lowly duty which never can fail or swerve,
May wait on that Lady of God, and serve her as love can serve.

Temperance, Fortitude, Prudence, and Justice that none gainsaith,
These are the handmaids to wait on her Charity, Hope, and Faith.

And still, as the time draws on that bringeth her womanhood,
Above her, in golden grace, the Spirit of God will brood,

As she goes in her lovely maidhood, the Rose of God's own morn,
The one and only stainless of earth begotten and born.

Then, lo! in her life's fair prime, alone in a still, sweet place,
She will hear the Angel of God who haileth her Full of Grace.

For she herself indeed is the chosen of God to bring
To the world its fair redemption, to Sion her Priest and King.

And she, in her simple meekness, that honour supreme will take,
As a little child the gift that its father's hand doth make.

A shelter meet shall be hers, in a dear and quiet light,
The hallowed love and the care of the stainless workman-knight.

And he will know God's secret, in her, the beloved, revealed;
In her, His garden inclosed; in her, His fountain sealed;

Though none but she can endure the gift that is hers, to win
That great lone splendour of God none other can enter in.

Oh! marvellous things, too deep, too high, for thought and speech,
This Maid, the Spouse of the Spirit, the Mother of God, shall reach.

Thou God, whose thought is creation, Thou God to whom time is nought,
In the babe that is born to-day Thou seest Redemption wrought.

As one great Now before Thee past, present and future lie,
And the manger throne is here, and the altar of Calvary.

The joy and the pain of the Cross are in that ear of Thine,
As the Babe Christ's laugh, and the cry of the Derelict divine.

The little hour of triumph Thou seest, by the children hailed;
And the Mother nailed in spirit where the Son in body is nailed.

The lifted gates eternal, the grandeur of sight and sound,
Where the Mother of love and sorrow in power and joy is crowned;

As all the voices of heaven in one great harmony blend
To bear the immortal Ave on music that has no end.

After Our Lady's Presentation

(St Joachim and St Anne are alone in the House at Nazareth)
Joachim

Wife, my wife, our journey o'er,
Here in our home are we once more.

Anne

Talk not of home, my Joachim,
For the light of home is low and dim.

Two we are that erst were three,
Thou and I and Babe Mary.

Oh, the Lord's courts be great and fair,
But who will play with my baby there?

Dost think the angels, Joachim,
Will sing our sweet her cradle hymn?

Or will the Lord, of His gentle grace,
Lend one angel her mother's face?

Lend him my voice in the quiet night,
If she should wake and cry with fright?

Oh, than I they are lovelier,
Yet I am fairer than they to her:

I, who am old and unfair to see,
Am fairest of all to my Babe Mary.

Joachim

Wife, thou wert glad but yester-eve,
And wherefore now should'st mourn and grieve?

All of our three days' home-coming,
The heart within thy breast did sing.

Yea, this morning, yea, this noon,
Thy thoughts were set to another tune.

Dost repent that our hands have given
This, the crown of our life, to Heaven?

Hush thee, let not the good Lord know
Thou art grieved for serving Him so.

Did we not vow we would not hold
Back from His hand this finest gold?

Vow that we would not keep from Him
The jewel that made all others dim?

Anne

God's was she, and we gave her Him—
But—the house without her, Joachim!

Nay, I repent me not, my spouse,
But the heart is a-chill in the empty house.

And we are old, and it may be vain
To think we shall see our child again.

And if again, O husband mine,
How shall we know her, what the sign?

No more our little Babe Mary,
But God's grave-eyed saint-lady.

Joachim

Anne, mother, weep not so:
What is God's to God doth go.

Wife, she danced in her lovely mirth
Joy more great than the joy of earth;

Danced, as her father David did,
With none to jeer or to forbid;

Danced on the temple steps in glee,
God's handmaid, our Babe Mary:

God's daughter beloved, and He
Holds in His arms our Babe Mary:

Holds in His everlasting arms,
Safe from terror and ghostly harms.

One day, perhaps, our eyes may see
What He doth with our Babe Mary.

One day, perchance, our ears may hear
What He has said in our darling's ear;

Though our weak feet may never go
The path He means our child to know:

So let us say,

Anne and Joachim
Be it done, O Lord,
To her according to Thy word!

The Visitation of Our Lady

WHO is passing along to-day,
Travelling on her joyful way?

Angels guard her and guide unseen,
But she goeth not an earthly queen,

This, the Lady born to be
Queen of Heaven for eternity.

Joyful she breathes the hills' clear breath,
As she goeth to greet Elizabeth.

The little conies unafraid
Play round the steps of the sinless Maid;

Just as they played ere Mother Eve
Taught creation to fear and grieve.

The song from the throat of singing bird
Is sweeter than ever before was heard:

The happy breath of leaf and flower
More fragrant than even in Eden bower:

And the eagle, from height magnific won,
Looks down to her, not up to the sun.

Divine, she goeth unrevealed,
A spring shut up, a fountain sealed:

But where she passeth, children play
Good and joyful the livelong day:

And tear-dimmed eyes and hearts that ache
Are glad for her lovely unknown sake.

Yet none of them dream how God doth rest
In the still shelter of her breast.

Swift she goes till her quest is won,
And she greets who carries the wondrous son;

The babe who leaps in his mother's womb
Because the Mother of God is come.

O blessed Maid of Nazareth!
O blessed wife, Elizabeth!

Youth and eld are face to face,
And clasp each other in dear embrace,

Loveliest youth and loveliest eld,
Such as the world had ne'er beheld.

Eld made young by the gracious power
Of the joy of the fair conception-hour:

Bright in the honour laid on her,
To carry the Lord Christ's harbinger:

And youth that stands this wondrous day,
The Wisdom of God for ever and aye.

These did the Lord together bring
In the time of love's dear visiting:

An Act of Faith

I believe in Thee!
Father eternal,
Maker supernal
Of all that is, and that was, and is yet to be,
The passing, and the enduring infinitely,
And Love's Begetter from all eternity.
Maker and Father of all, Maker and Father of me,
My God, I believe in Thee.

I believe in Thee!
Supremest Lover
Who didst discover
The one sole way to vanquish the great-waved sea
Rolling 'twixt God and man unebbingly,
Till, smit by Thy lifted cross, it turned to flee.
Lover, Redeemer of all, Lover, Redeemer of me,
My God, I believe in Thee.

I believe in Thee!
Life's Lord, Life's Giver,
For aye and ever
Source and Fountain of boundless sanctity,
Pouring high sapience and wisdom royally
Down on Thy suppliant people, the blest, the free,
Thou who art fain to hallow all men, oh, hallow me,
My God, I believe in Thee.

Come unto Me

Come unto Me!
Who biddeth? A little Child
On a Mother's knee.
Little Child, we come to Thee.

Come unto Me!
Who biddeth? A Man who dies
On a blood-stained tree.
Dying One, we come to Thee.

Come unto Me!
Who biddeth? Our risen Lord
Of eternity.
Risen Lord, we come to Thee.

Come unto Me!
Who biddeth? our God gone up
In His majesty.
God ascended, we come to Thee.

Come unto Me!
Love-born, love-slain, love-raised,
Love-enthronéd, we
At Thine altar come to Thee.

The Epiphany

Three Kings went upon their way,
To find a mightier King than they.

Three Wise Men, with heaven-taught eyes,
Looked for the Wisest of the wise.

The mighty ones to their Mightier
Brought gold and frankincense and myrrh.

The wise knelt to the Wisest One:
The Star had led them to the Sun.

The grown Kings had their joy complete
Low at a little Child-King's feet.

All the way the Kings had trod,
Seeking a king, and finding God.

Little King, greatest King,
Unto Thee our hearts we bring!

A Certain Creditor

Dear lord, there was a certain Creditor—
Thou knowest who, and who His debtor was,
And is, and ever so shall be, because
He who hath much forgiven, yet o'er and o'er
Goes on, and draws from out His boundless store
Of mercy; blasts not, no, nor overawes
With all the dreadful beauty of His laws;
Saying only, Love Me, child, I ask no more:

Go on, O Lord, love Thine unworthy one,
And give me will and power to love Thee; yet
Forgive not that, but multiply the debt,
Still owing, still to owe, and still to owe,
Thou sweetest Creditor, on yet, and on,
A sum whose total I shall never know.

“Ye have not known Me”

“Light, more light!” he cries,
While away from the Light he turns,
With the anguish in his eyes
Of a heart that vainly yearns.

Meat and drink would he have,
And he leaves in his daily tread
The banquet the angels crave,
And goeth his way unfed.

For beauty his soul is athirst;
And he will not look and see
Thy beauty, O Last, O First,
Old, new, for eternity.

For music his being is fain;
And he will not hearken and hear
The notes of Thy deathless strain
That are sounding great and clear.

And love he seeks with a heart
All sore for its passionate need;
And knoweth Thee not, who art,
Thou only, Love indeed.

On Thy blood-purpled Rood,
On Thy white Throne above,
We hail Thee, O Light, O Food,
O Beauty, O Music, O Love!

An Offering

Suffer me, O my Lord, my God, to bring
And lay before Thy feet some offering!

This poor hard heart forbids my tears to flow:
I cannot wash Thy feet, my Master, so:

And precious nard I cannot pour upon
Those lovely feet, whose toil my ransom won:

What shall I give Thee, then? For shame and wrong
Freely forgiven, I offer—just a song:

I offer just a song to Thee, whose gift
Of love has known nor measuring nor thrift.

To Thee, O Giver of all precious worth,
A song that rises dulled through mists of earth!

Yet in Thy love be it accepted free,
And heard as Thou would'st have it sung for Thee.

Acts

(1) At Morning:

My God, I offer Thee
All Thou appointest me;
All that the day may bring
Of joy or suffering;
All that Thou givest to-day;
All that Thou takest away;
All Thou would'st have me be;
My God, I offer Thee.

(2) At Noon:

Lord, in Thy piercèd hands
I lay my heart:
Lord, at Thy piercèd feet
I choose my part;
Lord, in Thy wounded side
Let me abide.

(3) At Night:

Now that the day doth end,
My spirit I commend
To Thee, my Lord, my Friend.
Into Thy hands, yea, Thine,
Those glorious hands benign,
Those human hands divine,
My spirit I resign.

Aftermath

To the fields where thou hadst mown in summertide
Came a Lady most exceeding fair to see;
And she looked upon the brown fields lying wide;
And she smiled upon thy fields and smiled on thee.

Oh, that smile it was the springlight come again,
Springlight fair as on the heart of Eden laid:
And the patter sounded as of early rain,
And the sunshine blessed each little stalk and blade.

Must not autumn meadows once again be green,
In a warmth and light as dear as summer hath,
If the Queen of Christendom have walked therein,
If her feet have hallowed for an aftermath?