Religious Poems
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SUGGESTED BY THE DEATH OF MRS. PROFESSOR STUART OF ANDOVER, MASSHOW quiet, through the hazy autumn air,The elm-boughs wave with many a gold-flecked leaf!How calmly float the dreamy mantled cloudsThrough these still days of autumn, fair and brief!Our Andover stands thoughtful, fair, and calm,Waiting to lay her summer glories byE'er the bright flush shall kindle all her pines,And her woods blaze with autumn's heraldry.By the old mossy wall the golden-rodWaves as aforetime, and the purple spraysOf starry asters quiver to the breeze,Rustling all stilly through the forest ways.No voice of triumph from those silent skiesBreaks on the calm, and speaks of glories near,Nor bright wings flutter, nor fair glistening robesProclaim that heavenly messengers are here.Yet in our midst an angel hath come down,Troubling the waters in a peaceful home;And from that home, of life's long sickness healed,A saint hath risen, where pain no more may come.Christ's fair elect one, from a hidden lifeOf loving deeds and words of gentleness,Hath passed where all are loving and beloved,Beyond all weariness and all distress.Calm, like a lamb in shepherd's bosom borne,Quiet and trustful hath she sunk to rest;God breathed in tenderness the sweet "Well done!"That scarce awoke a trance so still and blest.Ye who remember the long loving years,The patient mother's hourly martyrdom,The self-renouncing wisdom, the calm trust,Rejoice for her whose day of rest is come!Father and mother, now united, standWaiting for you to bind the household chain;The tent is struck, the home is gone before,And tarries for you on the heavenly plain.By every wish repressed and hope resigned,Each cross accepted and each sorrow borne,She dead yet speaketh, she doth beckon youTo tread the path her patient feet have worn.Each year that world grows richer and more dearWith the bright freight washed from life's stormy shore;O goodly clime, how lovely is thy strand,With those dear faces seen on earth no more!The veil between this world and that to comeGrows tremulous and quivers with their breath;Dimly we hear their voices, see their hands,Inviting us to the release of death.O Thou, in whom thy saints above, below,Are one and undivided, grant us graceIn patience yet to bear our daily cross, —In patience run our hourly shortening race!And while on earth we wear the servant's form,And while life's labors ever toilful be,Breathe in our souls the joyful confidenceWe are already kings and priests with thee.SUMMER STUDIES
WHY shouldst thou study in the month of JuneIn dusky books of Greek and Hebrew lore,When the Great Teacher of all glorious thingsPasses in hourly light before thy door?There is a brighter book unrolling now;Fair are its leaves as is the tree of heaven,All veined and dewed and gemmed with wondrous signs,To which a healing mystic power is given.A thousand voices to its study call,From the fair hill-top, from the waterfall,Where the bird singeth, and the yellow bee,And the breeze talketh from the airy tree.Now is that glorious resurrection timeWhen all earth's buried beauties have new birth:Behold the yearly miracle complete, —God hath created a new heaven and earth!No tree that wants its joyful garments now,No flower but hastes his bravery to don;God bids thee to this marriage feast of joy,Let thy soul put the wedding garment on.All fringed with festal gold the barberry stands;The ferns, exultant, clap their new-made wings;The hemlock rustles broideries of fresh green,And thousand bells of pearl the blueberry rings.The long, weird fingers of the old white-pinesDo beckon thee into the flickering wood,Where moving spots of light show mystic flowers,And wavering music fills the dreamy hours.Hast thou no time for all this wondrous show, —No thought to spare? Wilt thou forever beWith thy last year's dry flower-stalk and dead leaves,And no new shoot or blossom on thy tree?See how the pines push off their last year's leaves.And stretch beyond them with exultant bound:The grass and flowers, with living power, o'ergrowTheir last year's remnants on the greening ground.Wilt thou, then, all thy wintry feelings keep,The old dead routine of thy book-writ lore,Nor deem that God can teach, by one bright hour,What life hath never taught to thee before?See what vast leisure, what unbounded rest,Lie in the bending dome of the blue sky:Ah! breathe that life-born languor from thy breast,And know once more a child's unreasoning joy.Cease, cease to think, and be content to be;Swing safe at anchor in fair Nature's bay;Reason no more, but o'er thy quiet soulLet God's sweet teachings ripple their soft way.Soar with the birds, and flutter with the leaf;Dance with the seeded grass in fringy play;Sail with the cloud, wave with the dreaming pine,And float with Nature all the livelong day.Call not such hours an idle waste of time, —Land that lies fallow gains a quiet power;It treasures, from the brooding of God's wings,Strength to unfold the future tree and flower.And when the summer's glorious show is past,Its miracles no longer charm thy sight,The treasured riches of those thoughtful hoursShall make thy wintry musings warm and bright.HOURS OF THE NIGHT;
OR,
WATCHES OF SORROW
I.
MIDNIGHT
"He hath made me to dwell in darkness as those that have been long dead."
ALL dark! – no light, no ray!Sun, moon, and stars, all gone!Dimness of anguish! – utter void! —Crushed, and alone!One waste of weary pain,One dull, unmeaning ache,A heart too weary even to throb,Too bruised to break.No longer anxious thoughts,No longer hopes and fears,No strife, no effort, no desire,No tears.Daylight and leaves and flowers,Summer and song of bird! —All vanished! – dreams forever gone,Unseen, unheard!Love, beauty, youth, – all gone!The high, heroic vow,The buoyant hope, the fond desire, —All ashes now!The words they speak to meFar off and distant seem,As voices we have known and lovedSpeak in a dream.They bid me to submit;I do, – I cannot strive;I do not question, – I endure,Endure and live.I do not struggle more,Nor pray, for prayer is vain;I but lie still the weary hour,And bear my pain.A guiding God, a Friend,A Father's gracious cheer,Once seemed my own; but now even faithLies buried here.This darkened, deathly lifeIs all remains of me,And but one conscious wish, —To cease to be!II.
FIRST HOUR
"There was darkness over all the land from the sixth hour unto the ninth hour.
"And Jesus cried and said, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?"
THAT cry hath stirred the deadness of my soul;I feel a heart-string throb, as throbs a chordWhen breaks the master chord of some great harp;My heart responsive answers, "Why?" O Lord.O cross of pain! O crown of cruel thorns!O piercing nails! O spotless Sufferer there!Wert thou forsaken in thy deadly strife?Then canst thou pity me in my despair.Take my dead heart, O Jesus, down with theeTo that still sepulchre where thou didst rest;Lay it in the fair linen's spicy folds,As a dear mother lays her babe to rest.I am so worn, so weary, so o'erspent,To lie with thee in that calm trance were sweet;The bitter myrrh of long-remembered painMay work in me new strength to rise again.This dark and weary mystery of woe,This hopeless struggle, this most useless strife, —Ah, let it end! I die with thee, my Lord,To all I ever hoped or wished from life.I die with thee: thy fellowship of grief,Thy partnership with mortal misery,The weary watching and the nameless dread, —Let them be mine to make me one with thee.Thou hast asked, "Why?" and God will answer thee,Therefore I ask not, but in peace lie down,For the three days of mystery and rest,Till comes the resurrection and the crown.III.
SECOND HOUR
"They laid hold upon one Simon a Cyrenian, and on him they laid the cross, that he might bear it after Jesus."
ALONG the dusty thoroughfare of life,Upon his daily errands walking free,Came a brave, honest man, untouched by pain,Unchilled by sight or thought of misery.But lo! a crowd: – he stops, – with curious eyeA fainting form all pressed to earth he sees;The hard, rough burden of the bitter crossHath bowed the drooping head and feeble knees.Ho! lay the cross upon yon stranger there,For he hath breadth of chest and strength of limb.Straight it is done; and heavy laden thus,With Jesus' cross, he turns and follows him.Unmurmuring, patient, cheerful, pitiful,Prompt with the holy sufferer to endure,Forsaking all to follow the dear Lord, —Thus did he make his glorious calling sure.O soul, whoe'er thou art, walking life's way,As yet from touch of deadly sorrow free,Learn from this story to forecast the dayWhen Jesus and his cross shall come to thee.O, in that fearful, that decisive hour,Rebel not, shrink not, seek not thence to flee,But, humbly bending, take thy heavy load,And bear it after Jesus patiently.His cross is thine. If thou and he be one,Some portion of his pain must still be thine;Thus only mayst thou share his glorious crown,And reign with him in majesty divine.Master in sorrow! I accept my shareIn the great anguish of life's mystery.No more, alone, I sink beneath my load,But bear my cross, O Jesus, after thee.IV.
THIRD HOUR
THE MYSTERY OF LIFE"Let my heart calm itself in thee. Let the great sea of my heart, that swelleth with waves, calm itself in thee."
St. Augustine's Manual.LIFE'S mystery – deep, restless as the ocean —Hath surged and wailed for ages to and fro;Earth's generations watch its ceaseless motion,As in and out its hollow moanings flow.Shivering and yearning by that unknown sea,Let my soul calm itself, O Christ, in thee!Life's sorrows, with inexorable power,Sweep desolation o'er this mortal plain;And human loves and hopes fly as the chaffBorne by the whirlwind from the ripened grain.Ah! when before that blast my hopes all flee,Let my soul calm itself, O Christ, in thee!Between the mysteries of death and lifeThou standest, loving, guiding, not explaining;We ask, and thou art silent; yet we gaze,And our charmed hearts forget their drear complaining.No crushing fate, no stony destiny,O Lamb that hast been slain, we find in thee!The many waves of thought, the mighty tides,The ground-swell that rolls up from other lands,From far-off worlds, from dim, eternal shores,Whose echo dashes on life's wave-worn strands,This vague, dark tumult of the inner seaGrows calm, grows bright, O risen Lord, in thee!Thy piercéd hand guides the mysterious wheels;Thy thorn-crowned brow now wears the crown of power;And when the dread enigma presseth sore,Thy patient voice saith, "Watch with me one hour."As sinks the moaning river in the seaIn silver peace, so sinks my soul in thee!V.
FOURTH HOUR
THE SORROWS OF MARYDEDICATED TO THE MOTHERS WHO HAVE LOST SONS IN THE LATE WARI SLEPT, but my heart was waking,And out in my dreams I sped,Through the streets of an ancient city,Where Jesus, the Lord, lay dead.He was lying all cold and lowly,And the sepulchre was sealed,And the women that bore the spicesHad come from the holy field.There is feasting in Pilate's palace,There is revel in Herod's hall,Where the lute and the sounding instrumentTo mirth and merriment call."I have washed my hands," said Pilate,"And what is the Jew to me?""I have missed my chance," said Herod,"One of his wonders to see."But why should our courtly circleTo the thought give further place?All dreams, save of pleasure and beauty,Bid the dancers' feet efface."* * * * * * *I saw a light from a casement,And entered a lowly door,Where a woman, stricken and mournful,Sat in sackcloth on the floor.There Mary, the mother of Jesus,And John, the belovéd one,With a few poor friends beside them,Were mourning for Him that was gone.And before the mother was lyingThat crown of cruel thorn,Wherewith they crowned that gentle browIn mockery that morn.And her ears yet ring with the anguishOf that last dying cry, —That mighty appeal of agonyThat shook both earth and sky.O God, what a shaft of anguishWas that dying voice from the tree! —From Him the only spotless, —"Why hast Thou forsaken me?"And was he of God forsaken?They ask, appalled with dread;Is evil crowned and triumphant,And goodness vanquished and dead?Is there, then, no God in Jacob?Is the star of Judah dim?For who would our God deliver,If he would not deliver him?If God could not deliver, – what hope then?If he would not, – who ever shall dareTo be firm in his service hereafter?To trust in his wisdom or care?So darkly the Tempter was saying,To hearts that with sorrow were dumb;And the poor souls were clinging in darkness to God,With hands that with anguish were numb.* * * * * * *In my dreams came the third day morning,And fairly the day-star shone;But fairer, the solemn angel,As he rolled away the stone.In the lowly dwelling of Mary,In the dusky twilight chill,There was heard the sound of coming feet,And her very heart grew still.And in the glimmer of dawning,She saw him enter the door,Her Son, all living and real,Risen, to die no more!Her Son, all living and real,Risen no more to die, —With the power of an endless life in his face,With the light of heaven in his eye.O mourning mothers, so many,Weeping o'er sons that are dead,Have ye thought of the sorrows of Mary's heart,Of the tears that Mary shed?Is the crown of thorns before you?Are there memories of cruel scorn?Of hunger and thirst and bitter coldThat your beloved have borne?Had ye ever a son like JesusTo give to a death of pain?Did ever a son so cruelly die,But did he die in vain?Have ye ever thought that all the hopesThat make our earth-life fairWere born in those three bitter daysOf Mary's deep despair?O mourning mothers, so many,Weeping in woe and pain,Think on the joy of Mary's heartIn a Son that is risen again.Have faith in a third-day morning,In a resurrection-hour;For what ye sow in weakness,He can raise again in power.Have faith in the Lord of that thorny crown,In the Lord of the piercéd hand;For he reigneth now o'er earth and heaven,And his power who may withstand?And the hopes that never on earth shall bloom,The sorrows forever new,Lay silently down at the feet of HimWho died and is risen for you.VI.
DAY DAWN
THE dim gray dawn, upon the eastern hills,Brings back to light once more the cheerless scene;But oh! no morning in my Father's houseIs dawning now, for there no night hath been.Ten thousand thousand now, on Zion's hills,All robed in white, with palmy crowns, do stray,While I, an exile, far from fatherland,Still wandering, faint along the desert way.O home! dear home! my own, my native home!O Father, friends! when shall I look on you?When shall these weary wanderings be o'er,And I be gathered back to stray no more?O Thou, the brightness of whose gracious faceThese weary, longing eyes have never seen, —By whose dear thought, for whose belovéd sake,My course, through toil and tears, I daily take, —I think of thee when the myrrh-dropping mornSteps forth upon the purple eastern steep;I think of thee in the fair eventide,When the bright-sandalled stars their watches keep.And trembling hope, and fainting, sorrowing love,On thy dear word for comfort doth rely;And clear-eyed Faith, with strong forereaching gaze,Beholds thee here, unseen, but ever nigh.Walking in white with thee, she dimly sees,All beautiful, these lovely ones withdrawn,With whom my heart went upward, as they rose,Like morning stars, to light a coming dawn.All sinless now, and crowned and glorified,Where'er thou movest move they still with thee,As erst, in sweet communion by thy side,Walked John and Mary in old Galilee.But hush, my heart! 'T is but a day or twoDivides thee from that bright, immortal shore.Rise up! rise up! and gird thee for the race!Fast fly the hours, and all will soon be o'er.Thou hast the new name written in thy soul;Thou hast the mystic stone He gives his own.Thy soul, made one with him, shall feel no moreThat she is walking on her path alone.VII.
WHEN I AWAKE I AM STILL WITH THEE
STILL, still with Thee, when purple morning breaketh,When the bird waketh and the shadows flee;Fairer than morning, lovelier than the daylight,Dawns the sweet consciousness, I am with Thee!Alone with Thee, amid the mystic shadows,The solemn hush of nature newly born;Alone with Thee in breathless adoration,In the calm dew and freshness of the morn.As in the dawning o'er the waveless oceanThe image of the morning star doth rest,So in this stillness Thou beholdest onlyThine image in the waters of my breast.Still, still with Thee! as to each new-born morningA fresh and solemn splendor still is given,So doth this blessed consciousness, awaking,Breathe, each day, nearness unto Thee and heaven.When sinks the soul, subdued by toil, to slumber,Its closing eye looks up to Thee in prayer;Sweet the repose beneath the wings o'ershading,But sweeter still to wake and find Thee there.So shall it be at last, in that bright morningWhen the soul waketh and life's shadows flee;O, in that hour, fairer than daylight dawning,Shall rise the glorious thought, I am with Thee!PRESSED FLOWERS FROM ITALY
A DAY IN THE PAMFILI DORIA
THOUGH the hills are cold and snowy,And the wind drives chill to-day,My heart goes back to a spring-time,Far, far in the past away.And I see a quaint old city,Weary and worn and brown,Where the spring and the birds are so early,And the sun in such light goes down.I remember that old-times villa,Where our afternoons went by,Where the suns of March flushed warmly,And spring was in earth and sky.Out of the mouldering city,Mouldering, old, and gray,We sped, with a lightsome heart-thrill,For a sunny, gladsome day, —For a revel of fresh spring verdure,For a race 'mid springing flowers,For a vision of plashing fountains,Of birds and blossoming bowers.There were violet banks in the shadows,Violets white and blue;And a world of bright anemones,That over the terrace grew, —Blue and orange and purple,Rosy and yellow and white,Rising in rainbow bubbles,Streaking the lawns with light.And down from the old stone pine-trees,Those far off islands of air,The birds are flinging the tidingsOf a joyful revel up there.And now for the grand old fountains,Tossing their silvery spray,Those fountains so quaint and so many,That are leaping and singing all day.Those fountains of strange weird sculpture,With lichens and moss o'ergrown,Are they marble greening in moss-wreaths?Or moss-wreaths whitening to stone?Down many a wild, dim pathwayWe ramble from morning till noon;We linger, unheeding the hours,Till evening comes all too soon.And from out the ilex alleys,Where lengthening shadows play,We look on the dreamy Campagna,All glowing with setting day, —All melting in bands of purple,In swathings and foldings of gold,In ribands of azure and lilac,Like a princely banner unrolled.And the smoke of each distant cottage,And the flash of each villa white,Shines out with an opal glimmer,Like gems in a casket of light.And the dome of old St. Peter'sWith a strange translucence glows,Like a mighty bubble of amethystFloating in waves of rose.In a trance of dreamy vaguenessWe, gazing and yearning, beholdThat city beheld by the prophet,Whose walls were transparent gold.And, dropping all solemn and slowly,To hallow the softening spell,There falls on the dying twilightThe Ave Maria bell.With a mournful motherly softness,With a weird and weary care,That strange and ancient citySeems calling the nations to prayer.And the words that of old the angelTo the mother of Jesus brought,Rise like a new evangel,To hallow the trance of our thought.With the smoke of the evening incense,Our thoughts are ascending thenTo Mary, the mother of Jesus,To Jesus, the Master of men.O city of prophets and martyrs,O shrines of the sainted dead,When, when shall the living day-springOnce more on your towers be spread?When He who is meek and lowlyShall rule in those lordly halls,And shall stand and feed as a shepherdThe flock which his mercy calls, —O, then to those noble churches,To picture and statue and gem,To the pageant of solemn worship,Shall the meaning come back again.And this strange and ancient city,In that reign of His truth and love,Shall be what it seems in the twilight,The type of that City above.THE GARDENS OF THE VATICAN
SWEET fountains, plashing with a dreamy fall,And mosses green, and tremulous veils of fern,And banks of blowing cyclamen, and stars,Blue as the skies, of myrtle blossoming,The twilight shade of ilex overheadO'erbubbling with sweet song of nightingale,With walks of strange, weird stillness, leading on'Mid sculptured fragments half to green moss gone,Or breaking forth amid the violet leavesWith some white gleam of an old world gone by.Ah! strange, sweet quiet! wilderness of calm,Gardens of dreamy rest, I long to layBeneath your shade the last long sigh, and say,Here is my home, my Lord, thy home and mine;And I, having searched the world with many a tear,At last have found thee and will stray no more.But vainly here I seek the GardenerThat Mary saw. These lovely halls beyond,That airy, sky-like dome, that lofty fane,Is as a palace whence the king is goneAnd taken all the sweetness with himself.Turn again, Jesus, and possess thine own!Come to thy temple once more as of old!Drive forth the money-changers, let it beA house of prayer for nations. Even so,Amen! Amen!ST. PETER'S CHURCH
HOLY WEEK, APRIL, 1860O FAIREST mansion of a Father's love,Harmonious! hospitable! with thine armsOutspread to all, thy fountains ever full,And, fair as heaven, thy misty, sky-like domeHung like the firmament with circling sweepAbove the constellated golden lampsThat burn forever round the holy tomb.Most meet art thou to be the Father's house,The house of prayer for nations. Come the timeWhen thou shalt be so! when a liberty,Wide as thine arms, high as thy lofty dome,Shall be proclaimed, by thy loud singing choirs,Like voice of many waters! Then the LordShall come into his temple, and make pureThe sons of Levi; then, as once of old,The blind shall see, the lame leap as an hart,And to the poor the Gospel shall be preached,And Easter's silver-sounding trumpets tell,"The Lord is risen indeed," to die no more.Hasten it in its time. Amen! Amen!THE MISERERE
NOT of the earth that music! all things fade;Vanish the pictured walls! and, one by one,The starry candles silently expire!And now, O Jesus! round that silent crossA moment's pause, a hush as of the grave.Now rises slow a silver mist of sound,And all the heavens break out in drops of grief;A rain of sobbing sweetness, swelling, dying,Voice into voice inweaving with sweet throbs,And fluttering pulses of impassioned moan, —Veiled voices, in whose wailing there is awe,And mysteries of love and agony,A yearning anguish of celestial souls,A shiver as of wings trembling the air,As if God's shining doves, his spotless birds,Wailed with a nightingale's heart-break of grief,In this their starless night, when for our sinsTheir sun, their life, their love, hangs darkly there,Like a slain lamb, bleeding his life away!1
According to this legend, Catherine was a noble maiden of Alexandria, distinguished alike by birth, riches, beauty, and the rarest gifts of genius and learning. In the flower of her life she consecrated herself to the service of her Redeemer, and cheerfully suffered for his sake the loss of wealth, friends, and the esteem of the world. Banishment, imprisonment, and torture were in vain tried to shake the constancy of her faith; and at last she was bound upon the torturing-wheel for a cruel death. But the angels descended, so says the story, rent the wheel, and bore her away, through the air, far over the sea, to Mount Sinai, where her body was left to repose, and her soul ascended with them to heaven.