A Channel Passage and Other Poems Part 3

VI

Since man, with a child's pride proud, and abashed as a child and afraid, Made G.o.d in his likeness, and bowed him to worship the Maker he made, No faith more dire hath enticed man's trust than the saint's whose creed Made Caiaphas one with Christ, that worms on the cross might feed.

Priests gazed upon G.o.d in the eyes of a babe new-born, and therein Beheld not heaven, and the wise glad secret of love, but sin.

Accursed of heaven, and baptized with the baptism of hatred and h.e.l.l, They spat on the name they despised and adored as a sign and a spell.

"Lord Christ, thou art G.o.d, and a liar: they were children of wrath, not of grace, Unbaptized, unredeemed from the fire they were born for, who smiled in thy face."

Of such is the kingdom--he said it--of heaven: and the heavenly word Shall live when religion is dead, and when falsehood is dumb shall be heard.

And the message of James and of John was as Christ's and as love's own call: But wrath pa.s.sed sentence thereon when Annas replied in Paul.

The dark old G.o.d who had slain him grew one with the Christ he slew, And poison was rank in the grain that with growth of his gospel grew.

And the blackness of darkness brightened: and red in the heart of the flame Shone down, as a blessing that lightened, the curse of a new G.o.d's name.

Through centuries of burning and trembling belief as a signal it shone, Till man, soul-sick of dissembling, bade fear and her frauds begone.

G.o.d Cerberus yelps from his throats triune: but his day, which was night, Is quenched, with its stars and the notes of its night-birds, in silence and light.

The flames of its fires and the psalms of their psalmists are darkened and dumb: Strong winter has withered the palms of his angels, and stricken them numb.

G.o.d, father of lies, G.o.d, son of perdition, G.o.d, spirit of ill, Thy will that for ages was done is undone as a dead G.o.d's will.

Not Mahomet's sword could slay thee, nor Borgia's or Calvin's praise: But the scales of the spirit that weigh thee are weighted with truth, and it slays.

The song of the day of thy fury, when nature and death shall quail, Rings now as the thunders of Jewry, the ghost of a dead world's tale.

That day and its doom foreseen and foreshadowed on earth, when thou, Lord G.o.d, wast lord of the keen dark season, are sport for us now.

Thy claws were clipped and thy fangs plucked out by the hands that slew Men, lovers of man, whose pangs bore witness if truth were true.

Man crucified rose again from the sepulchre builded to be No grave for the souls of the men who denied thee, but, Lord, for thee.

When Bruno's spirit aspired from the flames that thy servants fed, The spirit of faith was fired to consume thee and leave thee dead.

When the light of the sunlike eyes whence laughter lightened and flamed Bade France and the world be wise, faith saw thee naked and shamed.

When wisdom deeper and sweeter than Rabelais veiled and revealed Found utterance diviner and meeter for truth whence anguish is healed, Whence fear and hate and belief in thee, fed by thy grace from above, Fall stricken, and utmost grief takes light from the l.u.s.tre of love, When Shakespeare shone into birth, and the world he beheld grew bright, Thy kingdom was ended on earth, and the darkness it shed was light.

In him all truth and the glory thereof and the power and the pride, The song of the soul and her story, bore witness that fear had lied.

All hope, all wonder, all trust, all doubt that knows not of fear, The love of the body, the l.u.s.t of the spirit to see and to hear, All womanhood, fairer than love could conceive or desire or adore, All manhood, radiant above all heights that it held of yore, Lived by the life of his breath, with the speech of his soul's will spake, And the light lit darkness to death whence never the dead shall wake.

For the light that lived in the sound of the song of his speech was one With the light of the wisdom that found earth's tune in the song of the sun; His word with the word of the lord most high of us all on earth, Whose soul was a lyre and a sword, whose death was a deathless birth.

Him too we praise as we praise our own who as he stand strong; Him, aeschylus, ancient of days, whose word is the perfect song.

When Caucasus showed to the sun and the sea what a G.o.d could endure, When wisdom and light were one, and the hands of the matricide pure, A song too subtle for psalmist or prophet of Jewry to know, Elate and profound as the calmest or stormiest of waters that flow, A word whose echoes were wonder and music of fears overcome, Bade Sinai bow, and the thunder of G.o.dhead on h.o.r.eb be dumb.

The childless children of night, strong daughters of doom and dread, The thoughts and the fears that smite the soul, and its life lies dead, Stood still and were quelled by the sound of his word and the light of his thought, And the G.o.d that in man lay bound was unbound from the bonds he had wrought.

Dark fear of a lord more dark than the dreams of his worshippers knew Fell dead, and the corpse lay stark in the sunlight of truth shown true.

VII

Time, and truth his child, though terror set earth and heaven at odds, See the light of manhood rise on the twilight of the G.o.ds.

Light is here for souls to see, though the stars of faith be dead: All the sea that yearned and trembled receives the sun instead.

All the shadows on the spirit when fears and dreams were strong, All perdition, all redemption, blind rain-stars watched so long, Love whose root was fear, thanksgiving that cowered beneath the rod, Feel the light that heals and withers: night weeps upon her G.o.d.

All the names wherein the incarnate Lord lived his day and died Fade from suns to stars, from stars into darkness undescried.

Christ the man lives yet, remembered of man as dreams that leave Light on eyes that wake and know not if memory bid them grieve.

Fire sublime as lightning shines, and exults in thunder yet, Where the battle wields the name and the sword of Mahomet.

Far above all wars and gospels, all ebb and flow of time, Lives the soul that speaks in silence, and makes mute earth sublime.

Still for her, though years and ages be blinded and bedinned, Mazed with lightnings, crazed with thunders, life rides and guides the wind.

Death may live or death may die, and the truth be light or night: Not for gain of heaven may man put away the rule of right.

A NEW YEAR'S EVE

CHRISTINA ROSSETTI DIED DECEMBER 29, 1894

The stars are strong in the deeps of the l.u.s.trous night, Cold and splendid as death if his dawn be bright; Cold as the cast-off garb that is cold as clay, Splendid and strong as a spirit intense as light.

A soul more sweet than the morning of new-born May Has pa.s.sed with the year that has pa.s.sed from the world away.

A song more sweet than the morning's first-born song Again will hymn not among us a new year's day.

Not here, not here shall the carol of joy grown strong Ring rapture now, and uplift us, a spell-struck throng, From dream to vision of life that the soul may see By death's grace only, if death do its trust no wrong.

Scarce yet the days and the starry nights are three Since here among us a spirit abode as we, Girt round with life that is fettered in bonds of time, And clasped with darkness about as is earth with sea.

And now, more high than the vision of souls may climb, The soul whose song was as music of stars that chime, Clothed round with life as of dawn and the mounting sun, Sings, and we know not here of the song sublime.

No word is ours of it now that the songs are done Whence here we drank of delight as in freedom won, In deep deliverance given from the bonds we bore.

There is none to sing as she sang upon earth, not one.

We heard awhile: and for us who shall hear no more The sound as of waves of light on a starry sh.o.r.e Awhile bade brighten and yearn as a father's face The face of death, divine as in days of yore.

The grey gloom quickened and quivered: the sunless place Thrilled, and the silence deeper than time or s.p.a.ce Seemed now not all everlasting. Hope grew strong, And love took comfort, given of the sweet song's grace.

Love that finds not on earth, where it finds but wrong, Love that bears not the bondage of years in throng Shone to show for her, higher than the years that mar, The life she looked and longed for as love must long.

Who knows? We know not. Afar, if the dead be far, Alive, if the dead be alive as the soul's works are, The soul whose breath was among us a heavenward song Sings, loves, and shines as it shines for us here a star.

IN A ROSARY

Through the low grey archway children's feet that pa.s.s Quicken, glad to find the sweetest haunt of all.

Brightest wildflowers gleaming deep in l.u.s.tiest gra.s.s, Glorious weeds that glisten through the green sea's gla.s.s, Match not now this marvel, born to fade and fall.

Roses like a rainbow wrought of roses rise Right and left and forward, shining toward the sun.

Nay, the rainbow lit of sunshine droops and dies Ere we dream it hallows earth and seas and skies; Ere delight may dream it lives, its life is done.

Round the border hemmed with high deep hedges round Go the children, peering over or between Where the dense bright oval wall of box inwound, Reared about the roses fast within it bound, Gives them grace to glance at glories else unseen.

Flower outlightening flower and tree outflowering tree Feed and fill the sense and spirit full with joy.

Nought awhile they know of outer earth and sea: Here enough of joy it is to breathe and be: Here the sense of life is one for girl and boy.

Heaven above them, bright as children's eyes or dreams, Earth about them, sweet as glad soft sleep can show Earth and sky and sea, a world that scarcely seems Even in children's eyes less fair than life that gleams Through the sleep that none but sinless eyes may know.

Near beneath, and near above, the terraced ways Wind or stretch and bask or blink against the sun.

Hidden here from sight on soft or stormy days Lies and laughs with love toward heaven, at silent gaze, All the radiant rosary--all its flowers made one.

All the mult.i.tude of roses towering round Dawn and noon and night behold as one full flower, Fain of heaven and loved of heaven, curbed and crowned, Raised and reared to make this plot of earthly ground Heavenly, could but heaven endure on earth an hour.