Chapter M: S. M (2)

Close to the Sacred Heart, it nestles fair--
A marble poem; an aesthetic dream
Of sculptured beauty, fit to be the theme
Of angel fancies; a Madonna-prayer
Uttered in stone. Round columns light as air,
And fretted cornice, Sharon’s Rose is wreathed--
The passion-flower, the thorn-girt lily rare,
The palm, the wheat, the grapes in vine-leaves sheathed.
Tenderly bright, from mullioned windows glow
Our Lady’s chaplet-mysteries. Behold,
Her maiden statue in that shrine of snow,
Looks upward to the skies of blue and gold;
Content that in the crypt, beneath her shining feet,
The holy ones repose in dreamless slumber sweet.

MARY IMMACULATE

BY ELEANOR C. DONNELLY

“Pure as the snow,” we say. Ah! never flake
Fell through the air
One-tenth as fair
As Mary’s soul was made for Christ’s dear sake.
Virgin Immaculate,
The whitest whiteness of the Alpine snows,
Beside thy stainless spirit, dusky grows.

“Pure as the stars.” Ah! never lovely night
Wore in its diadem
So pure a gem
As that which fills the ages with its light.
Virgin Immaculate,
The peerless splendors of thy soul by far
Outshine the glow of heaven’s serenest star.

THE PILGRIM

BY ELEANOR DOWNING

Behind me lies the mistress of the East,
Golden in evening, fairy dome on dome
Poised and irised like the far-flung foam
Lashed on the ribs of some forsaken coast.
Wicked and lovely temptress, fruitless boast
Of all that man may build and little be,
Mart of the world’s base passions, where thy feast
Of shame was spread, thy sin encompassed me,
Where all desires and all dreams were rife
With lust of flesh and eye and pride of life,
Lo! I have reft thy carnal mastery--
I have gone forth and shut the gates of thee.

Before me lies the desert and the night,
White star and gold above a pathless waste,
Blue shade and gray to where the world effaced
Flings loose its shadows on the lap of God.
Briars and dust upon my brow, unshod,
In pilgrim weeds athwart a vineless land,
My feet shall pass and mark the path aright,
For lo! Thy staff and rod are in my hand;
And with the light Thy city shall unfurl
Its golden oriflames and tents of pearl--
Dead Babylon, thy gilden clasp I flee;
Jerusalem, lift up thy gates to me!

ON THE FEAST OF THE ASSUMPTION

BY ELEANOR DOWNING

“Mary, uplifted to our sight
In cloudy vesture stainless-white,
Why are thine eyes like stars alight,
Twin flames of charity?”
“Mine eyes are on His glorious face
That shone not on earth’s darkened place,
But clothed and crowned me with grace--
The God who fathered me!”

“Mary, against the sinless glow
Of angel pinions white as snow,
Why are thy fair lips parted so
In ecstasy of love?”
“My lips are parted to His breath
Who breathed on me in Nazareth
And gave me life to live in death--
My Spouse, the spotless Dove!”

“Mary, whose eager feet would spurn
The very clouds, whose pale hands yearn
Toward rifted Heaven that fires burn
Where once was fixed the sword?”
“The fires I felt when His child head
Lay on this mother’s heart that bled,
And when it lay there stark and dead--
My little Child, my Lord!”

MARY

BY ELEANOR DOWNING

A garden like a chalice-cup,
With bloom of almond white and pink,
And starred hibiscus to the brink,
From which sweet waters bubble up.
A garden walled with ilex-trees
And topped with blue, white clouds between
Save where the glossed leaves’ twinkling green
Is stirred by some soft-footed breeze
A place apart, a watered glade,
Where sin and sorrow have not been,
And earth’s complaint grows hushed within
Its greening aisles of sacred shade.

The circling arms, the flower face,
Such were they to the Child soft-pressed,
Who drew all sweetness from the breast
Of her whom angels crowned with grace.

A night of storm and wailing stress,
A coast that cradles to the shock
Of waves that lap the pitted rock,
And winds that shriek their wrathfulness;
A night of all wild things unpent,
Strange voices and strange shapes that beat
To chill the heart and snare the feet.
And through the tempest, beacon-bent
To shelter from the driving damp
Bespeaking warmth and sweet repose
Within its sanctuary close,
The welcome of a red shrine-lamp.

So unto Him Who, weary, pressed
Through the fierce storm of wrath and hate,
Shone Mary’s love, a chapel-gate
Where He might enter Him and rest.

A desert filled with shining sand,
And still as death the skies that bend
Where to horizon without end
The rounding distances expand.
A desert white with burning heat
And parched silence without stir,
And at its heart a voyager,
Where Death and daggered noonday meet;
And Thirst that grips him by the throat;
When from the distance wreathing blue,
No mirage, but a dream come true,
Crowned palm-tree and pale waters float.

To Christ upon the rood, when dim
Fell on His brow the Shade accurst,
So Mary slaked His burning thirst
With her white soul held up to Him.

EXTREME UNCTION

BY ERNEST DOWSON

Upon the eyes, the lips, the feet,
On all the passages of sense,
The atoning oil is spread with sweet
Renewal of lost innocence.

The feet, that lately ran so fast
To meet desire, are soothly sealed;
The eyes, that were so often cast
On vanity, are touched and healed.

From troublous sights and sounds set free
In such a twilight hour of breath,
Shall one retrace his life, or see,
Through shadows, the true face of death?

Vials of mercy! Sacring oils!
I know not where nor when I come,
Nor through what wanderings and toils,
To crave of you Viaticum.

Yet, when the walls of flesh grow weak,
In such an hour, it well may be,
Through mist and darkness, light will break,
And each anointed sense will see.

BENEDICTIO DOMINI

BY ERNEST DOWSON

Without, the sullen noises of the street!
The voice of London, inarticulate,
Hoarse and blaspheming, surges in to meet
The silent blessing of the Immaculate.

Dark is the church, and dim the worshippers,
Hushed with bowed heads as though by some old spell,
While through the incense-laden air there stirs
The admonition of a silver bell.

Dark is the church, save where the altar stands,
Dressed like a bride, illustrious with light,
Where one old priest exalts with tremulous hands
The one true solace of man’s fallen plight.

Strange silence here: without, the sounding street
Heralds the world’s swift passage to the fire;
O Benediction, perfect and complete!
When shall men cease to suffer and desire?

CARTHUSIANS

BY ERNEST DOWSON

Through what long heaviness, assayed in what strange fire,
Have these white monks been brought into the way of peace,
Despising the world’s wisdom and the world’s desire,
Which from the body of this death bring no release?

Within their austere walls no voices penetrate;
A sacred silence only, as of death, obtains;
Nothing finds entry here of loud or passionate;
This quiet is the exceeding profit of their pain.

From many lands they came, in divers fiery ways;
Each knew at last the vanity of earthly joys;
And one was crowned with thorns, and one was crowned with bays,
And each was tired at last of the world’s foolish noise.

It was not theirs with Dominic to preach God’s holy wrath,
They were too stern to bear sweet Francis’ gentle sway;
Theirs was a higher calling and a steeper path,
To dwell alone with Christ, to meditate and pray.

A cloistered company, they are companionless,
None knoweth here the secret of his brother’s heart:
They are but come together for more loneliness,
Whose bond is solitude and silence all their part.

O beatific life! Who is there shall gainsay,
Your great refusal’s victory, your little loss,
Deserting vanity for the more perfect way,
The sweetest service of the most dolorous Cross.

Ye shall prevail at last! Surely ye shall prevail!
Your silence and your austerity shall win at last:
Desire and Mirth, the world’s ephemeral lights shall fail,
The sweet star of your queen is never overcast.

We fling up flowers and laugh, we laugh across the wine;
With wine we dull our souls and careful strains of art;
Our cups are polished skulls round which the roses twine:
None dares to look at Death who leers and lurks apart.

Move on, white company, whom that has not sufficed!
Our viols cease, our wine is death, our roses fail:
Pray for our heedlessness, O dwellers with the Christ!
Though the world fall apart, surely ye shall prevail.

MARIS STELLA

BY AUGUSTA THEODOSIA DRANE

Mary, beautiful and bright
“Velut Maris Stella,”
Brighter than the morning light,
“Parens et Puella,”
I cry to thee, look down on me;
Ladye, pray thy Son for me,
“Tam pia,”
That thy child may come to thee,
“Maria.”

Sad the earth was and forlorn,
“Eva peccatrice,”
Until Christ our Lord was born
“De te Genitrice”;
Gabriel’s “Ave” chased away
Darksome night, and brought the day
“Salutis”;
Thou the Fount whence waters play
“Virtutis.”

Ladye, Flower of living thing,
“Rosa sine spina”;
Mother of Jesus, heaven’s King,
“Gratia divinia”;
’Tis thou in all dost bear the prize,
Ladye, Queen of Paradise,
“Electa,”

Maiden meek and Mother wise,
“Effecta.”
In care thou counsellest the best,
“Felix fecundata”;
To the weary thou are rest,
“Mater honorata”;
Plead in thy love to Him who gave
His precious Blood the world to save
“In cruce,”
That we our home with Him may have
“In luce.”

Well knows he, that he is thy Son,
“Ventre quem portasti”;
All thou dost ask Him, then, is won,
“Partum quem lactasti”;
So pitiful He is and kind,
By Him the road to bliss we find
“Superni”;
He doth the gates of darkness bind
“Inferni.”

AN AUTUMN ROSE-TREE

BY MICHAEL EARLS, S.J.

It seemed too late for roses
When I walked abroad to-day,
October stood in silence,
By the hedges all the way:
Yet did I hear a singing,
And I saw a red rose-tree:--
In fields so gray with autumn
How could song or roses be?

Oh, it was never maple
Nor the dogwood’s coat afire,
No sage with scarlet banners,
Nor the poppy’s vested choir:
The breeze that may be music
When the summer lawns are fair
Will have no heart for singing
In the autumn’s mournful air.

As I went up the roadway,
Under cold and lonely skies,
A song I heard, a rose-tree
Waved to me in glad surprise:--
A red cloak and a ribbon,
(Round the braided hair of jet)
And redder cheeks than roses
Of a little Margaret.

Now God is good in autumn,
He can name the birds that sing,
He loves the hearts of children
More than flowery fields of spring:
And when the years of winter
Gray with Margaret will be,
God will find her love still blossom
Like a red rose-tree.

TO A CARMELITE POSTULANT

(San Francisco, May, 1910)

BY MICHAEL EARLS, S.J.

Oh, the banks of May are fair,
Charm of sound and sight,
Breath of heaven fills the air,
To the world’s delight.

Far more wondrous is a bower,
Fairer than the May,
Love-of-God it wears in flower,
Blooming night and day.

Love-of-God within the heart
Multicolored grows,
Now a lily’s counterpart,
Now the blood-red rose.

Come the sun or chilling rain,
Come the drought or dew,
Crocus health or violet pain,
Love-of-God is true.

Hard may be the mountain-side,
Soft the valley sod,
Yet will fragrance sure abide
With the Love-of-God.

Where the grace of Heaven leads,
There it makes a home,
Hills a hundred and the meads
Will its pathway roam.

Carmel by the western sea
Holds your blessed bower:
Love-of-God eternally
Keep your heart a-flower.

A PURPOSE OF AMENDMENT

BY HELEN PARRY EDEN

He who mangold-patch doth hoe,
Sweating beneath a sturdy sun,
Clearing each weed-disguised row
Till day-light and the task be done,

Standeth to view his labour’s scene--
Where now, within the hedge-row’s girth,
The little plants untrammeled green
Stripes the brown fabric of the earth.

So when the absolution’s said
Behind the grille, and I may go,
And all the flowers of sin are dead,
And all the stems of sin laid low,

And I am come to Mary’s shrine
To lay my hopes within her hand--
Ah, in how fair and green a line
The seedling resolutions stand.

THE CONFESSIONAL

BY HELEN PARRY EDEN

My Sorrow diligent would sweep
That dingy room infest
With dust (thereby I mean my soul)
Because she hath a Guest
Who doth require that self-same room
Be garnished for His rest.

And Sorrow (who had washed His feet
Where He before had been)
Took the long broom of Memory
And swept the corners clean,
Till in the midst of the fair floor
The sum of dust was seen.

It lay there, settled by her tears,
That fell the while she swept--
Light fluffs of grey and earthly dregs;
And over these she wept,
For all were come since last her Guest
Within the room had slept.

And, for nor broom nor tears had power
To lift the clods of ill,
She called one servant of her Guest
Who came with right good will,
For, by his sweet Lord’s bidding, he
Waiteth on Sorrow still;

So, seeing she had done her part
As far as in her lay
And had intent to keep the place
More cleanly from that day,
Did with his Master’s dust-pan come
And take the dust away.

She thanked him, and Him who sent
Such succor, and she spread
Fair sheets of Thankfulness and Love
Upon her Master’s bed,
Then on the new-scoured threshold stood
And listened for His tread.

AN ELEGY, FOR FATHER ANSELM, OF THE ORDER OF REFORMED CISTERCIANS, GUEST-MASTER AND PARISH PRIEST

“Et pastores erant in regione eadem vigilantes”

BY HELEN PARRY EDEN

You to whose soul a death propitious brings
Its Heaven, who attain a windless bourne
Of sanctity beyond all sufferings,
It is not ours to mourn;

For you, to whom the earth could nothing give,
Who knew no hint of our inspired pride,
You could not very well be said to live
Until the day you died.

’Tis upon us--father and kindly friend,
Holy and cheerful host--the unbidden guest
You welcomed and the souls you would amend,
The weight of sorrow rests.

From Sarum in the mesh of her five streams,
Her idle belfries and her glittering vanes,
We are clomb to where the cloud-race dusks and gleams
On turf of upland plains.

Southward the road through juniper and briar
Clambers the down, untrodden and unworn
Save where some flock pitted the chalky mire
With little feet at dawn.

Twice in a week the hooded carrier’s lamp,
Flashing on wayside flints and grasses, spills
Its misty radiance where the dews lie damp
Among the untended hills;

Here lies the hamlet ringed with grassy mound
And brambled barrow where, superbly dead,
The dust of pagans turned to holy ground
Beneath your humble tread.

Here we descend at drooping dusk the side
Of the stony down beneath the planted ring
Of beeches where you showed with pastoral pride
The folded lambs in spring;

Here pull at eve the self-same bell that hastened
Your rough-shod feet behind the hollow door--
Yet never see you stand, the chain unfastened,
Your lantern on the floor.

Others will spread the board now you are gone
Here where you smiled and gave your guests to eat,
Learning your menial kingliness from One
Who washed His servant’s feet;

Along the slumbering corridors betimes
Others will knock and other footsteps pass
Down the wet lane e’er the thin shivering chimes
Toll for the early mass.

Yet in the chapel’s self no sorrows sing
In the strange priest’s voice, nor any dolour grips
The heart because it is not you who bring
Your Master to its lips.

Here let us leave the things you would not have--
Vain grief and sorrow useless to be shown--
“God’s gift and the Community’s I gave
And nothing of my own,”

You would have said, self-deemed of no more worth
That then green hands that guard a poppy’s grace--
Blows the eternal flower and back to earth
Tumbles the withered case.

Nay, but Our Lord hath made renouncement vain,
Himself into those humble hands let fall,
Guerdon of willing poverty and pain,
The greatest gift of all;

To you and all who in that life austere
Mid fields remote your harsher labours ply
Singing His praise, girt round from year to year
With sheep-bells and the sky--

This, that to you is larger audience given
Where prayer and praise with sighing pinions shod
Piercing the starry ante-rooms of Heaven
Sway the designs of God:

And now yourself, standing where late hath stood
The echo of your voice, are prayer and praise--
O sweet reward and unsurpassing good
For that small gift of days.

Yourself, who now have heard such summoning
And seen such burning clarities alight
As broke the vigilant shepherds’ drowsy ring
On the predestined night,

Who made such haste as theirs who rose and trod
To Bethlehem the dew-encumbered grass,
Trustful to see the showing forth of God
And the Word come to pass;

With how much more than home-spun Israelites’
Poor hungry glimpse of Godhead are you blest
Whom Mary shows for more than mortal nights
The Jewel on her breast.

Yet, as one kneeling churl might chance to think
Of the wan herd behind their wattled bars,
Moving unshepherded with bells that clink
And stir beneath the stars,

And, for the thought’s space wishing he were back,
Pray, to that Sum of Sweetness for his sheep--
“Take them, O Thou that dost supply our lack,
Into Thy hands to keep.”

So you who in His presence move and live
Recall amid your glad celestial cares,
Your chosen office, to your children give
The charity of prayers.

SORROW

BY HELEN PARRY EDEN

Of Sorrow, ’tis as Saints have said--
That his ill-savoured lamp shall shed
A light to Heaven, when, blown about
By the world’s vain and windy rout,
The candles of delight burn out.

Then usher Sorrow to thy board,
Give him such fare as may afford
Thy single habitation--best
To meet him half-way in his quest,
The importunate and sad-eyed guest.

Yet somewhat should he give who took
My hospitality, for look,
His is no random vagrancy;
Beneath his rags what hints there be
Of a celestial livery.

Sweet Sorrow, play a grateful part,
Break me the marble of my heart
And of its fragments pave a street
Where, to my bliss, myself may meet
One hastening with piercèd feet.

OUR LADY’S DEATH

BY FATHER EDMUND, C.P.

And didst thou die, dear Mother of our Life?
Sin had no part in thee; then how should death?
Methinks, if aught the great tradition saith
Could wake in loving hearts a moment’s strife
(I said--my own with her new image rife),

’Twere this. And yet ’tis certain, next to faith
Thou didst lie down to render up thy breath:
Though after the seventh sword, no meaner knife

Could pierce that bosom. No, nor did: no sting
Of pain was there; but only joy. The love,
So long thy life ecstatic, and restrained
From setting free thy soul, now gave it wing;
Thy body, soon to reign with it above,
Radiant and fragrant, as in trance, remained.

VIGIL OF THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION

BY MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN

A sword of silver cuts the fields asunder--
A silver sword to-night, a lake in June--
And plains of snow reflect, the maples under,
The silver arrows of a wintry noon.

The trees are white with moonlight and with ice-pearls;
The trees are white, like ghosts we see in dreams;
The air is still: there are no moaning wind-whirls;
And one sees silence in the quivering beams.

December night, December night, how warming
Is all thy coldness to the Christian soul:
Thy very peace at each true heart is storming
In potent waves of love that surging roll.

December night, December night, how glowing
Thy frozen rains upon our warm hearts lie:
Our God upon this vigil is bestowing
A thousand graces from the silver sky.

O moon, O symbol of our Lady’s whiteness;
O snow, O symbol of our Lady’s heart;
O night, chaste night, bejewelled with argent brightness,
How sweet, how bright, how loving, kind thou art.

O miracle: to-morrow and to-morrow,
In tender reverence shall no praise abate;
For from all seasons shall we new jewels borrow
To deck the Mother born Immaculate.

THE OLD VIOLIN

BY MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN

Though tuneless, stringless, it lies there in dust,
Like some great thought on a forgotten page;
The soul of music cannot fade or rust,--
The voice within it stronger grows with age;
Its strings and bow are only triffling things--
A master-touch!--its sweet soul wakes and sings.

MAURICE DE GUERIN

BY MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN

The old wine filled him, and he saw, with eyes
Anoint of Nature, fauns and dryads fair
Unseen by others; to him maidenhair
And waxen lilacs, and those birds that rise
A-sudden from tall reeds at slight surprise,
Brought charmed thoughts; and in earth everywhere
He, like sad Jaques, found a music rare
As that of Syrinx to old Grecians wise.
A pagan heart, a Christian soul had he,
He followed Christ, yet for dead Pan he sighed,
Till earth and heaven met within his breast;
As if Theocritus in Sicily
Had come upon the Figure crucified
And lost his gods in deep, Christ-given rest.

HE MADE US FREE

BY MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN

As flame streams upward, so my longing thought
Flies up with Thee,
Thou God and Saviour who hast truly wrought
Life out of death, and to us, loving, brought
A fresh, new world; and in Thy sweet chains caught,
And made us free!

As hyacinths make way from out the dark,
My soul awakes,
At thought of Thee, like sap beneath the bark;
As little violets in field and park
Rise to the trilling thrush and meadow-lark,
New hope it takes.

As thou goest upward through the nameless space
We call the sky,
Like jonquil perfume softly falls Thy grace;
It seems to touch and brighten every place;
Fresh flowers crown our wan and weary race,
O Thou on high.

Hadst Thou not risen, there would be no more joy
Upon earth’s sod;
Life would still be with us a wound or toy,
A cloud without the sun,--O Babe, O Boy,
A Man of Mother pure, with no alloy,
O risen God!

Thou, God and King, didst “mingle in the game,”
(Cease, all fears; cease!)
For love of us,--not to give Virgil’s fame
Or Croesus’ wealth, not to make well the lame,
Or save the sinner from deserved shame,
But for sweet Peace!

For peace, for joy,--not that the slave might lie
In luxury,
Not that all woe from us should always fly,
Or golden crops with Syrian roses vie
In every field; but in Thy peace to die
And rise,--be free!

THE GRANDEURS OF MARY

BY FREDERICK WILLIAM FABER, D.D.

What is this grandeur I see up in heaven,
A splendour that looks like a splendour divine?
What creature so near the Creator is throned?
O Mary, those marvellous glories are thine.

But who would have thought that a creature could live
With the fires of the Godhead so awfully nigh?
Oh, who could have dreamed, mighty Mother of God,
That ever God’s power could have raised thee so high?

What name can we give to a queenship so grand?
What thought can we think of a glory like this?
Saints and angels lie far in the distance, remote
From the golden excess of thine unmated bliss.

Thy person, thy soul, thy most beautiful form,
Thine office, thy name, thy most singular grace--
God hath made for them, Mother, a world by itself,
A shrine all alone, a most worshipful place.

Mid the blaze of those fires, eternal, unmade,
Thy Maker unspeakably makes thee his own;
The arms of the Three Uncreated, outstretched,
Round the Word’s mortal Mother in rapture are thrown.

Thy sinless conception, thy jubilant birth,
Thy crib and thy cross, thine assumption and crown,
They have raised thee on high to the right hand of Him
Whom the spells of thy love to thy bosom drew down.

I am blind with thy glory; in all God’s wide world
I find nothing like thee for glory and power:
I can hardly believe that thou grewest on earth,
In the green fields of Juda, a scarce-noticed flower.

And is it not really eternal, divine?
Is it human, created, a glorified heart,
So like God, and not God? Ah, Maker of men,
We bless thee for being the God that thou art.

O Mary, what ravishing pageants I see,
What wonders and works centre round thee in heaven,
What creations of grace fall like light from thy hands,
What creator-like powers to thy prudence are given.

What vast jurisdiction, what numberless realms,
What profusion of dread and unlimited power,
What holy supremacies, awful domains,
The Word’s mighty Mother enjoys for her dower.

What grand ministrations of pity and strength,
What endless processions of beautiful light,
What incredible marvels of motherly love,
What queenly resplendence of empire and right.

What sounds as of seas flowing all round thy throne,
What flashings of fire from thy burning abode,
What thunders of glory, what tempests of power,
What calms, like the calms in the Bosom of God.

Inexhaustible wonder; the treasures of God
Seem to multiply under thy marvellous hand;
And the power of thy Son seems to gain and to grow,
When He deigns to obey thy maternal command.

Ten thousand magnificent greatnesses blend
Their vast oceans of light, at the foot of thy throne;
Ten thousand unspeakable majesties grace
The royalty vested in Mary alone.

But look, what a wonder there is up in God:
One love, like a special perfection, we see;
And the chief of thy grandeurs, great Mother, is there--
In the love the Eternal Himself has for thee.

THE RIGHT MUST WIN

BY FREDERICK WILLIAM FABER, D.D.

Oh, it is hard to work for God,
To rise and take His part
Upon this battlefield of earth,
And not sometimes lose heart.

He hides Himself so wondrously,
As though there were no God;
He is least seen when all the powers
Of ill are most abroad.

Or He deserts us at the hour
The fight is all but lost;
And seems to leave us to ourselves
Just when we need Him most.

Ill masters good; good seems to change
To ill with greatest ease;
And, worst of all, the good with good
Is at cross-purposes.

Ah! God is other than we think;
His ways are far above,
Far beyond reason’s height, and reached
Only by child-like love.

Workman of God! Oh, lose not heart,
But learn what God is like;
And in the darkest battle-field
Thou shalt know where to strike.

Thrice blessed is he to whom is given
The instinct that can tell
That God is on the field when He
Is most invisible.

Blessed too, is he who can divine
Where real right doth lie,
And dares to take the side that seems
Wrong to man’s blindfold eye.

For right is right, since God is God;
And right the day must win;
To doubt would be disloyalty,
To falter would be sin.

MATER DOLOROSA

BY JOHN FITZPATRICK, O.M.I.

She stands, within the shadow, at the foot
Of the high tree she planted: thirty-three
Full years have sped, and such has grown to be
The stem that burgeoned forth from Jesse’s root.
Spring swiftly passed and panted in pursuit
The eager summer; now she stands to see
The only fruit-time of her only tree:
And all the world is waiting for the Fruit.

Now is faith’s sad fruition: this one hour
Of gathered expectation wears the crown
Of the long grief with which the years were rife;
As in her lap--a sudden autumn shower--
The earthquake with his trembling hand shakes down
The red, ripe Fruitage of the Tree of Life.

YULETIDE

BY ALICE FURLONG

In a stable bare,
Lo, the great Ones are.
Strew the Ivy and the Myrtle
Round about the Virgin’s kirtle!

Ass and oxen mild
Breathe soft upon the Child!
Blow the scent of bygone summer
On your breath to the New-comer!

Be ye well content
To be straitly pent
Backwards in the rocky chamber
From the angel’s wings of amber!

Rapt the seraphs sit,
With godly faces lit
In a radiance shining solely
From the Christ-child, meek and holy.

High they chant and clear
Of the lovely cheer
Ring down the new evangels
Of the mystic, midnight angels.

Faring with good will
From the misty hill,
Every shepherd sacrificeth
To the prophet that ariseth.

Joseph, Mary’s spouse,
Prince of David’s House,
Bendeth low in adorations
To the Ruler of the Nations.

Who doth sweetly rest
On his Mother’s breast,
Lord of the lightnings and the thunders!
Mary’s heart keeps all these wonders.

OUR LADY OF THE ROSARY

BY FRANCIS A. GAFFNEY, O.P.

Lepanto marks the spot of victory,
O’er crescent cruel and strong, by forces weak,
Of hallowed cross; of which, “if sign you seek,”
’Tis not of man but a Divinity.
The white-robed Pius Fifth the Rosary
Uplifted like the rod of Moses, meek;
Whilst Ottomans on Christians wrath would wreak
And, as of old, engulfed them in the sea.

O Lady of the Rosary to-day,
Thy clients all beseech thee, hear their prayer,
And beg the Christ Who raging storms did quell,
Bid warring nations cease their bloody fray;
His power and thine honor, we declare,
O Thou All-Fair, thou joy of Israel.

AT THE LEAP OF THE WATERS

BY EDWARD F. GARESCHÉ, S.J.

How the swift river runs bright to its doom,
Placid and shining and smooth-flowing by,
Blue with the gleam of the heavenly room,
Smiling and calm with the smile of the sky!
Ah, but the plunge! and the shock and the roar,
The spray of vast waters that hurl to the deep,
The churn of its foam, as the measureless pour
Of that wide-brimming torrent leaps sheer from the steep!
Look ye; it reaches small fingers of spray
To clutch at the brink, as unwilling to go
Through the perilous air, and be fretted away
In the tumult of vapor that boileth below.
List ye! the voice of the huge undertone
That murmurs in pain from the cataract’s breast,
Where the bruised, shattered waters perpetual moan
And wander and toss in a weary unrest.
Feel ye the breath of the cool-spraying mist,
Cloudy and gray from the depths of its pain;
Not as when sunbeams the waters have kissed,
Rising in vapor to gather in rain,
But fiercely and madly flung forth on the air,
A shroud for this river that leaps to its death,
A veil o’er the throes of the cataract there,
And rolling and rent with its agonized breath!
Wild torrent! God put thee to thunder His name!
With the roar of thy waters to call to the sky
Of His might, Who hath set thee forever the same,
To topple in foam to the gulfs from on high.
Loud hymn of the lake-lands! from shore unto shore,
Still clamor His praises Who called thee to be,
Till the ears of the nations are tuned to thy roar,
And they hear the vast message He trusted to thee.

NIAGARA

BY EDWARD F. GARESCHÉ, S.J.

God, in His ages past the dawn of days,
Writ one white line of praise,
Which now, in this great stress and hour of need,
I bend my soul to read.
I break the sullen bonds of wearying time,
And with one leap sublime,
Force my astounded soul go back and stand
In the primaeval land!

The tresses of the ancient flood are kissed
With virginal, white mist.
The same soft, thunderous sound
Thrills the wild woods around,
But oh the vast and mighty peace that broods
On these green solitudes,
Where the great land, with one tremendous tone,
Litanies to God, alone!

Tongue of the continent! Thou whose hymning shakes
The bosom of the lakes!
O sacrificial torrent, keen and bright,
Hurled from thy glorious height!
Thou sacerdotal presence, clothed in power,
At once the victim and the white-robed priest,
Whose praise throughout these ages hath not ceased,
Whose altar steams with incense every hour!
Lo, in all days, from thy white waters, rise
The savors of perpetual sacrifice!
I see pale prophecy of Christ’s dear blood!--
The transubstantiation of thy flood!

Oh the wild wonder of the vast emotion
Of the perturbed wave,
That cries and wanders like the fearful ocean,
Seeking, with none to save!
In their wide agony the rapids roam,
A world of waves, an universe of pain!
The vexed, tumultous clamor of their foam
Crying to God with agonized refrain,
Where the sad rocks their quivering summits hide
In the loud anguish of the refluent tide.

Yet, with a willingness that leaps to sorrow
Swift run the ragged surges to the height,
And from their pain is born a pure delight--
The fear to-day, the snowy peace to-morrow!--
Cleaving like darts their swift and silvery way
With sudden gleams, and barbs of glittering spray,
They hurry to the brink, and swift are lost
In that stupendous leap, that infinite holocaust!

Oh Christ-like glory of the praying water
That leaps forever to its mystic death!
And from the anguish of that sobbing slaughter
Lifts the clear glory of the torrent’s breath,
Where like a paean of rapturous victory calls
The solemn jubilation of the falls!

O alabastrine priest--thy splendor spraying
More lasting than the immemorial hills!
O monument of waves, O undecaying
While God’s right hand thy flowing chalice fills!
Under the transient world’s astonished eyes
Thou offerest abiding sacrifice!

In the pale morning, when the rising sun
Flatters thy pouring flood with slanting beams,
Most reverent thy duteous waters run,
And hymn to God with all their thousand streams.
And in the blazing majesty of noon,
Still lifts thy wave its sacrificial tune,
And spills, like jewels of some eastern story,
Its bright, impetuous avalanche of glory!

And in the stilly spaces of the night,
While heaven wonders with its wakeful stars,
Thou prayest still, beneath the solemn light,
In booming tones that reach to heaven’s bars,
Keeping thy vigils, while the angelic moon
Walks on thy perilous verge with glorious shoon,
Chanting from foam and spray without encease
Thy yearning immemorial prayer for peace!

COMMUNION

BY CAROLINE GILTINAN

Mother Mary, thee I see
Bringing Him, thy Babe, to me,
Thou dost say, with trusting smile:
“Hold Him, dear, a little while.”
Mother Mary, pity me,
For He struggles to be free!
My heart, my arms--He finds defiled:
I am unworthy of thy Child.
Mary, Mother, charity!
Bring thy Baby back to me!

THE NIGHTINGALE

BY GERALD GRIFFIN

As the mute nightingale in closest groves
Lies hid at noon, but when day’s piercing eye
Is locked in night, with full heart beating high
Poureth her plain-song o’er the light she loves;
So, Virgin Ever-pure and Ever-blest,
Moon of religion, from whose radiant face
Reflected streams the light of heavenly grace
On broken hearts, by contrite thoughts oppressed:
So, Mary, they who justly feel the weight
Of Heaven’s offended Majesty, implore
Thy reconciling aid with suppliant knee:
Of sinful man, O sinless Advocate,
To thee they turn, nor Him they less adore;
’Tis still His light they love, less dreadful seen in thee.

TRYSTE NOEL

BY LOUISE IMOGEN GUINEY

The Ox he openeth wide the doore,
And from the Snowe he calls her inne,
And he hath seen her smile therefore,
Our Ladye without Sinne.
Now soone from Sleep
A Starre shall leap,
And sonne arrive both King and Hinde:
_Amen, Amen_:
But O the place co’d I but finde!

The Ox hath hushed his voyce and bent
Trewe eyes of Pitty ore the Mow,
And on his lovelie Neck, forspent,
The Blessed layes her Browe.
Around her feet,
Full Warme and Sweete,
His bowerie Breath doth meeklie dwell:
_Amen, Amen_:
But sore am I with Vaine Travel!

The Ox is Host in Judah stall
And Host of more than onlie one,
For close she gathereth withal
Our Lorde her littel Sonne.
Glad Hinde and King
Their Gyfte may bring,
But wo’d to-night my Teares were there,
_Amen, Amen_:
Between her Bosom and His hayre!

THE WILD RIDE

BY LOUISE IMOGEN GUINEY

_I hear in my heart, I hear in its ominous pulses
All day, on the road, the hoofs of invisible horses,
All night, from their stalls, the importunate pawing and neighing._

Let cowards and laggards fall back! but alert to the saddle,
Weatherworn and abreast, go men of our galloping legion,
With a stirrup-cup each to the lily of women that loves him.

The trail is through dolor and dread, over crags and morasses;
There are shapes by the way, there are things that appal or entice
us:
What odds? We are Knights of the Grail, we are vowed to the riding.

Thought’s self is a vanishing wing, and joy is a cobweb,
And friendship a flower in the dust, and glory a sunbeam:
Not here is our prize, nor, alas! after these our pursuing.

A dipping of plumes, a tear, a shake of the bridle,
A passing salute to this world and her pitiful beauty:
We hurry with never a word in the track of our fathers.

_I hear in my heart, I hear in its ominous pulses
All day, on the road, the hoofs of invisible horses,
All night, from their stalls, the importunate pawing and neighing._

We spur to a land of no name, outracing the stormwind;
We leap to the infinite dark like the sparks from the anvil.
Thou leadest, O God! All’s well with Thy troopers that follow.

ODE FOR A MASTER MARINER ASHORE

BY LOUISE IMOGEN GUINEY

There in his room, whene’er the moon looks in,
And silvers now a shell, and now a fin,
And o’er his chart glides like an argosy,
Quiet and old sits he.
Danger! he hath grown homesick for thy smile.
Where hidest thou the while, heart’s boast,
Strange face of beauty sought and lost,
Star-face that lured him out from boyhood’s isle?
Blown clear from dull indoors, his dreams behold
Night-water smoke and sparkle as of old,
The taffrail lurch, the sheets triumphant toss
Their phosphor-flowers across.
Towards ocean’s either rim the long-exiled
Wears on, till stunted cedars throw
A lace-like shadow over snow,
Or tropic fountains wash their agates wild.

Awhile, play up and down the briny spar
Odors of Surinam and Zanzibar,
Till blithely thence he ploughs, in visions new,
The Labradorian blue;
All homeless hurricanes about him break;
The purples of spent day he sees
From Samos to the Hebrides,
And drowned men dancing darkly in his wake.

Where the small deadly foam-caps, well descried,
Top, tier on tier, the hundred-mountained tide,
Away, and far away, his pride is borne,
Riding the noisy morn,
Plunges, and preens her wings, and laughs to know
The helm and tightening halyards still
Follow the urging of his will,
And scoff at sullen earth a league below.

Mischance hath barred him from his heirdom high,
And shackled him with many an inland tie,
And of his only wisdom made a jibe
Amid an alien tribe:
No wave abroad but moans his fallen state,
The trade-wind ranges now, the trade-wind roars!
Why is it on a yellowing page he pores?
Ah, why this hawser fast to a garden gate?

Thou friend so long withdrawn, so deaf, so dim,
Familiar Danger, O forget not him!
Repeat of thine evangel yet the whole
Unto his subject soul,
Who suffers no such palsy of her drouth,
Nor hath so tamely worn her chain,
But she may know that voice again,
And shake the reefs with answer of her mouth.

O give him back, before his passion fail,
The singing cordage and the hollow sail,
And level with those aged eyes let be
The bright unsteady sea;
And move like any film from off his brain
The pasture wall, the boughs that run
Their evening arches to the sun,
The hamlet spire across the sown champaign;
And on the shut space and the trivial hour,
Turn the great floods! and to thy spousal bower,
With rapt arrest and solemn loitering,
Him whom thou lovedst bring:
That he, thy faithful one, with praising lip,
Not having, at the last, less grace
Of thee than had his roving race,
Sum up his strength to perish with a ship.

IN LEINSTER

BY LOUISE IMOGEN GUINEY

I try to knead and spin, but my life is low the while.
Oh, I long to be alone, and walk abroad a mile;
Yet if I walk alone, and think of naught at all,
Why from me that’s young should the wild tears fall?

The shower-stricken earth, the earth-colored streams,
They breathe on me awake, and moan to me in dreams;
And yonder ivy fondling the broke castle-wall,
It pulls upon my heart till the wild tears fall.

The cabin-door looks down, a furze-lighted hill,
And far as Leighlin Cross the fields are green and still;
But once I hear the blackbird in Leighlin hedges call,
The foolishness is on me, and the wild tears fall!

AUNT MARY

A Christmas Chant

BY ROBERT STEPHEN HAWKER

Now, of all the trees by the king’s highway,
Which do you love the best?
O! the one that is green upon Christmas Day,
The bush with the bleeding breast.
Now the holly with her drops of blood for me:
For that is our dear Aunt Mary’s tree.

Its leaves are sweet with our Saviour’s Name,
’Tis a plant that loves the poor:
Summer and winter it shines the same
Beside the cottage door.
O! the holly with her drops of blood for me:
For that is our kind Aunt Mary’s tree.

’Tis a bush that the birds will never leave:
They sing in it all day long;
But sweetest of all upon Christmas Eve
Is to hear the robin’s song.
’Tis the merriest sound upon earth or sea:
For it comes from our own Aunt Mary’s tree.

So, of all that grows by the king’s highway,
I love that tree the best;
’Tis a bower for the birds upon Christmas Day,
The bush of the bleeding breast.
O! the holly with her drops of blood for me:
For that is our sweet Aunt Mary’s tree.

KING ARTHUR’S WAES-HAEL

BY ROBERT STEPHEN HAWKER

Waes-hael for knight and dame;
O merry be their dole;
Drink-hael! In Jesu’s name
We fill the tawny bowl;
But cover down the curving crest,
Mould of the Orient Lady’s breast.

Waes-hael! yet lift no lid:
Drain ye the reeds for wine.
Drink-hael! the milk was hid
That soothed that Babe divine;
Hush’d, as this hollow channel flows,
He drew the balsam from the rose.

Waes-hael! thus glowed the breast
Where a God yearned to cling;
Drink-hael! so Jesu pressed
Life from its mystic spring;
Then hush and bend in reverend sign
And breathe the thrilling reeds for wine.

Waes-hael! in shadowy scene
Lo! Christmas children we:
Drink-hael! behold we lean
At a far Mother’s knee;
To dream that thus her bosom smiled,
And learn the lip of Bethlehem’s Child.

OLD NUNS

BY JAMES M. HAYES

Our Lady smiles on youthful nuns,
She loves them well.
Our Lady’s smile like sunshine floods
Each convent cell,
But fondest falls Our Lady’s smile
Where old nuns dwell;

Old nuns whose hearts are young with love
For Mary’s Son,
Old nuns whose prayers for faltering souls
Have victory won,
Old nuns whose lives are beautiful
With service done.

Their love a loveless world has saved
From God’s dread rod,
The paths where Sorrow walks with Sin
Their feet have trod,
Their knees have worn the flags that pave
The house of God.

Our Lady smiles on youthful nuns,
She loves them well;
Our Lady’s smile like sunshine floods
Each convent cell;
But fondest falls Our Lady’s smile
Where old nuns dwell.

THE MOTHER OF THE ROSE

BY JAMES M. HAYES

I kneel on Holy Thursday with the faithful worshipping
Where Christ is throned in splendor as the sacramental King.

I ever will remember it, that wondrous full-blown rose
Among the burning tapers on the altar of repose.

O blessed among roses all, to bloom in beauty there,
To give your heart unto your God and in His glory share.

* * * * *

In quiet fields beyond the town, near where the river flows
There is a humble garden where a gentle rose-tree grows.

To-night Our Lord remembers on the altar of repose
This rose-tree in the fields afar, the mother of the rose.

THE TRANSFIGURATION

BY JAMES M. HAYES

He seeks the mountains where the olives grow,
The Lord of Glory, veiled in humble guise;
His soul is shadowed with a coming woe,
The grief of all the world is in His eyes:
His spirit struggles in the dark caress
Of anguish, pain and utter loneliness.

He always loved the mountain tops, for there
Away from earth, He treads the mystic ways,
And sees the vision of the Fairest Fair,
As Heaven dawns upon His raptured gaze;
The loneliness, the pain, the grief depart;
Surpassing gladness fills His Sacred Heart.

That day He stood upon the olive hill,
And Peter, James and John in wonder saw
The burning glories of the God-head fill
His soul with grandeur, and in holy awe
They fell upon the ground and cried for grace,
Lest they should die beholding God’s own Face.

As minor chords that sob from strings of gold
The Master speaks in accents sweet and sad:
The vision past, the chosen three behold
No one but Jesus and their souls are glad.
The awe, the splendor and the glory gone,
How sweet the face of Christ to look upon!

BELOVED, IT IS MORN

BY EMILY H. HICKEY

Beloved, it is morn!
A redder berry on the thorn,
A deeper yellow on the corn,
For this good day new-born.
Pray, Sweet, for me
That I may be
Faithful to God and thee.

Beloved, it is day!
And lovers work, as children play,
With heart and brain untired alway:
Dear love, look up and pray.
Pray, Sweet, for me
That I may be
Faithful to God and thee.

Beloved, it is night!
Thy heart and mine are full of light,
Thy spirit shineth clear and white,
God keep thee in His sight!
Pray, Sweet, for me
That I may be
Faithful to God and thee.

A SEA STORY

BY EMILY H. HICKEY

Silence. A while ago
Shrieks went up piercingly;
But now is the ship gone down;
Good ship, well manned, was she.
There’s a raft that’s a chance of life for one,
This day upon the sea.

A chance for one of two;
Young, strong, are he and he,
Just in the manhood prime,
The comelier, verily,
For the wrestle with wind and weather and wave,
In the life upon the sea.

One of them has a wife
And little children three;
Two that can toddle and lisp,
And a suckling on the knee:
Naked they’ll go, and hunger sore,
If he be lost at sea.

One has a dream of home,
A dream that well may be:
He never has breathed it yet;
She never has known it, she.
But some one will be sick at heart
If he be lost at sea.

“Wife and kids at home!--
Wife, kids, nor home has he!--
Give us a chance, Bill!” Then,
“All right, Jem!” Quietly
A man gives up his life for a man,
This day upon the sea.

THE STARLIGHT NIGHT

BY GERARD HOPKINS, S.J.

Look at the stars! look, look up at the skies!
O look at all the fire-folk sitting in the air!
The bright boroughs, the quivering citadels there!
The dim woods quick with diamond wells; the elf-eyes!
The grey lawns cold where quaking gold-dew lies!
Wind-beat white-beam; airy abeles all on flare!
Flake-doves sent floating out at a farmyard scare!--
Ah well! it is a purchase and a prize.

Buy then! Bid then!--What?--Prayer, patience, alms, vows,--
Look, look! a May-mess, like on orchard boughs;
Look! March-bloom, like on mealed-with-yellow sallows.--
These are indeed the barn: within-doors house
The shocks. This piece-bright paling hides the Spouse
Christ, and the mother of Christ and all his hallows.

THE HABIT OF PERFECTION

BY GERARD HOPKINS, S.J.

Elected Silence, sing to me
And beat upon my whorled ear,
Pipe me to pastures still and be
The music that I care to hear.

Shape nothing, lips; be lovely-dumb:
It is the shut, the curfew sent
From there where all surrenders come
Which only make you eloquent.

Be shelled, eyes, with double dark
And find the uncreated light;
This ruck and reel which you remark
Coils, keeps, and teases simple sight.

Palate, the hutch of tasty lust,
Desire not to be rinsed with wine:
The can must be so sweet, the crust
So fresh that come in fasts divine!

Nostrils, your careless breath that spend
Upon the stir and keep of pride,
What relish shall the censers send
Along the sanctuary side!

O feel-of-primrose hands, O feet
That want the yield of plushy sward,
But you shall walk the golden street,
And you unhouse and house the Lord.

And, Poverty, be thou the bride
And now the marriage feast begun,
And lily-colored clothes provide
Your spouse not labored-at, nor spun.

SPRING

BY GERARD HOPKINS, S.J.

Nothing is so beautiful as spring--
When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush:
Thrush’s eggs look little low heavens, and thrush
Through the echoing timber does so rinse and wring
The ear, it strikes like lightnings to hear him sing;
The glassy pear-tree leaves and blooms, they brush
The descending blue; that blue is all in a rush
With richness; the racing lambs too have fair their fling.

What is all this juice and all this joy?
A strain of the earth’s sweet being in the beginning
In Eden garden. Have, get, before it cloy,
Before it cloud, Christ, lord, and sour with shining,
Innocent mind and Mayday in girl and boy,
Most, O maid’s child, thy choice and worthy the winning.

THE FRIAR OF GENOA

BY SCHARMEL IRIS

In Genoa a friar walked;
Of every sacred tale he talked;
Alone he dwelt, in prayer he knelt;
“Ave Maria, Ave Maria!”
From dawn till dusk he sang.

His bruised and blistered feet were bare;
His head burned in the sunlight’s glare.
On stones he slept, and worked and wept,
“Ave Maria, Ave Maria!”
In every blow or pang.

Out of his dole he clothed the poor,
And every hardship did endure;
He blessed the meek and nursed the weak
“Ave Maria, Ave Maria!”
With each succeeding day.

And begged for alms for those in need,
A kind word spoke with every deed,
With sinners dined and led the blind--
“Ave Maria, Ave Maria!”
Until he passed away.

And is his work done? Ah, surprise!
Out of the tomb where low he lies
A perfume blows, as of a rose:
“Ave Maria, Ave Maria!”
It sings in shade or sun.

And he who breathes it, him it feeds,
And stirs his heart to noble deeds;
And one has said, “He is not dead--
“Ave Maria, Ave Maria!”
His life has just begun!”

THE DARK ANGEL

BY LIONEL JOHNSON

Dark Angel, with thine aching lust
To rid the world of penitence:
Malicious Angel, who still dost
My soul such subtile violence!

Because of thee, no thought, no thing,
Abides for me undesecrate:
Dark Angel, ever on the wing,
Who never reachest me too late!

When music sounds, then changest thou
Its silvery to a sultry fire:
Nor will thine envious heart allow
Delight untortured by desire.

Through thee, the gracious Muses turn
To Furies, O mine Enemy!
And all the things of beauty burn
With flames of evil ecstasy.

Because of thee, the land of dreams
Becomes a gathering place of fears:
Until tormented slumber seems
One vehemence of useless tears.

When sunlight glows upon the flowers,
Or ripples down the dancing sea:
Thou, with thy troop of passionate powers,
Beleaguerest, bewilderest, me.

Within the breath of autumn woods,
Within the winter silences:
Thy venomous spirit stirs and broods,
O Master of impieties!

The ardour of red flame is thine,
And thine the steely soul of ice:
Thou poisonest the fair design
Of nature, with unfair device.

Apples of ashes, golden bright;
Waters of bitterness, how sweet!
O banquet of a foul delight,
Prepared by thee, dark Paraclete!

Thou art the whisper in the gloom,
The hinting tone, the haunting laugh:
Thou art the adorner of my tomb,
The minstrel of mine epitaph.

I fight thee, in the Holy Name!
Yet, what thou dost, is what God saith:
Tempter! should I escape thy flame,
Thou wilt have helped my soul from Death:

The second Death, that never dies,
That cannot die, when time is dead:
Live Death, wherein the lost soul cries,
Eternally uncomforted.

Dark Angel, with thine aching lust!
Of two defeats, of two despairs:
Less dread, a change to drifting dust,
Than thine eternity of cares.

Do what thou wilt, thou shalt not so,
Dark Angel! triumph over me:
_Lonely, unto the Lone I go;
Divine, to the Divinity._

TE MARTYRUM CANDIDATUS

BY LIONEL JOHNSON

Ah, see the fair chivalry come, the companions of Christ!
White Horsemen, who ride on white horses, the Knights of God!
They, for their Lord and their Lover who sacrificed
All, save the sweetness of treading, where He first trod!