University of Virginia Library

DE AMICITIA

Beauty of Israel! thou on its high places
Fallen, wonderful in thy love to me!
King David! we too love with thee
Dear lovers' faces,
Infinite friendships, golden graces:
Hearts passionate, as the full and stirring sea.
We too have come upon the shining traces
Of white souls, while we walk this darker earth:
Celestial was their birth,
August, and issuing from Uranian races;
Kin to the morning stars, their choral mirth,
A matin melody.
The glory of a crown, gold tried in fire,
Shadows their brows:
They know it not, but hungering desire
For the White City, in their ardent eyes,
Burns: and the pure palm boughs,
Holy and stately from their clean hands rise:
Such brightness and such bravery shall they win!
And this of poor souls red with sin,
Who with the darkness house?
O thought, unkind, unwise!
With perfect faith we look within,
Where the truth lies.
Dew of the morning and the evening falls,
Falls cool and sweet, upon the scarlet flames,
The furnace of each heart:
And through their stormy music, music calls
The wandering children by fond, wistful names,
Dear and apart:
Music with gently pleading claims,
Music descending from glad Sion walls.
Whiter than wool, whiter than snow,
By grace and love, the stained souls grow:
Lilies they stand, who lay so low
In shameful mire of wrong and woe;
Lilies, to fill the Queen of Heaven's fair halls.
Angels of Mercy gently come and go
Between the Sacred Heart and these poor hearts:
Plying their ministrant strong parts,
With love in overflow.
Ah, friends too dear and goodly to be lost!
Though you be tempest-tost
On bitter surges, raised by envious arts
Of the great Unholy Ghost,
Prince of ill Angels, Captain of Hell's host!
Ah, friends of loving voices, and kind hands,
And eyes, that with all confidence accost
Ours in the silent eloquence of love,
As the heart understands!
Our faith above
Our fear prevails,
Driving it into desolate lands.
You to the very far off Land your sails
Have stoutly set:
Whatever adverse and malignant gales
Make you awhile forget
The straight course, and the ever faithful star,
Constant above the winds and waves and war.
Ah, yet
The Land, where all true lovers are,
Shall greet us with celestial hails:
The Land, that lures us from afar;
Land of the Love, that never fails,
The Light, that never pales;
The long, sweet Patience, that allows no let,
Though with disdain her pains be met,
Saying: They shall be yet
The captives of the Everlasting Love!
O gracious voice and unoracular!
Dove's voice indeed, but not Dodona's dove.
Wherefore above
Our fear triumphs our faith,
And saith
No word of dark and comfortless regret.
Ah, dear our friends, ours past the mists of death!
Ours, where the loved disciple, great Saint John,
Pillows his head upon
The only rest,
God's Breast!
Ours, in the strength of that enamoured breath,
Which rang from Patmos' exile guest:
God is Love! And of all men he knew best,
Who lay upon that Breast,
And heard the beating of the Heart of God:
Who Calvary trod,
And stood,
With Mary in her mourning Motherhood,
Beneath the Rood.
Friends, whose true care for us is our best proof,
From grace and good we keep not quite aloof!
Dear brother and dear brother,
We shall clasp hands beneath the eternal roof,
And see Saint John the Loved with Mary Mother!
Friends ever, as of old:
But there, with joy untold;
Joy, mightier than our mortal hearts can hold.
But hearts immortal made can never be
Feeble, nor overbold:
Hearts greatly stationed in eternity.
Friends, dear our friends, O fellowship of gold!
By ways of land and sea,
Ways manifold,
Ways marvellous,
Brought near to us!
Since you have found our friendship something worth,
And in our hearts, not a mere dust, nor dearth
Of what your own hearts hold so perfectly,
Courage and constancy:
Bear with us, while we bear the bonds of earth!
Bear with us, for if friendship pine,
Waver and wane,
Not yours, but ours,
Will be the sad fault, the disastrous sign,
Of friendship's drear decline
And drooping flowers:
But you against ourselves will we maintain
Friends without stain,
Of the true line.
Our visions are not vain!
Yours are the crown, the palm, the blessed reign,
The marvellous high strain
Of triumph trumpets blown from Sion walls.
Fair as her lilies you indeed shall stand,
Hand fast in hand,
Along the Queen of Heaven's high halls.
Black wind never yet blew,
Shall whelm and vanquish you
Riding the seas safe homeward to that strand,
Where from of old, though new,
The City of the eternal golden spires,
The valiant City of the Saints, desires
You for her citizens, past seas and fires,
Made white,
Fit for the Angels' and the Saints' delight,
Fit for God's sight.
Amid Seraphic and Uranian quires,
We hear your music celebrate your fight
Well fought, well won:
We know your night
Ended, your everlasting day begun:
We see you splendid in His Living Light,
The Lamb your Sun.
O royal David! we too love, like thee,
Friendship's confederacy:
Friends, than the cedars of Mount Lebanon,
Stronger; than orchards of Isle Avalon,
Fairer: O king! we love, like thee,
Friends, in their charity,
Wonderful: and we know them God's, each one.