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Poems

(1864–1868)

Barnfloor and Winepress

“And he said, If the Lord do not help thee, whence shall I help thee? out of the barnfloor, or out of the winepress?”

— 2 Kings 6:27

Thou that on sin’s wages starvest,

Behold we have the joy in Harvest:

For us was gathered the first-fruits

For us was lifted from the roots,

Sheaved in cruel bands, bruised sore,

Scourged upon the threshing-floor;

Where the upper mill-stone roof’d His Head,

At morn we found the Heavenly Bread,

And on a thousand Altars laid,

Christ our Sacrifice is made.

Those whose dry plot for moisture gapes,

We shout with them that tread the grapes:

For us the Vine was fenced with thorn,

Five ways the precious branches torn;

Terrible fruit was on the tree

In the Acre of Gethsemane;

For us by Calvary’s distress

The wine was rackèd from the press;

Now in our Altar vessels stored

Is the sweet Vintage of our Lord.

In Joseph’s garden they threw by

The riv’n Vine, leafless, lifeless, dry:

On Easter morn the Tree was forth,

In forty days reach’d Heaven from earth,

Soon the whole world is overspread;

Ye weary come into the shade.

The field where He has planted us

Shall shake his boughs as Libanus,

When He hath sheaved us in His sheaf,

When He has made us bear His leaf.

We scarcely call that Banquet food,

But even our Saviour’s and our blood,

We are so grafted on His Wood.

Myself unholy, from myself unholy

Myself unholy, from myself unholy

To the sweet living of my friends I look –

Eye-greeting doves bright-counter to the rook,

Fresh brooks to salt sand-teasing waters shoaly:

And they are purer, but alas not solely

The unquestion’d readings of a blotless book.

And so my trust, confused, struck, and shook

Yields to the sultry siege of melancholy.

He has a sin of mine, he its near brother,

Knowing them well I can but see the fall.

This fault in one I found, that in another:

And so, though each have one while I have all,

No better serves me now, save best; no other

Save Christ: to Christ I look, on Christ I call.

Let Me Be to Thee as the Circling Bird

Let me be to Thee as the circling bird,

Or bat with tender and air-crisping wings

That shapes in half-light his departing rings,

From both of whom a changeless note is heard.

I have found my music in a common word,

Trying each pleasurable throat that sings

And every praisèd sequence of sweet strings,

And know infallibly which I preferred.

The authentic cadence was discovered late

Which ends those only strains that I approve,

And other science all gone out of date

And minor sweetness scarce made mention of:

I have found the dominant of my range and state –

Love, O my God, to call thee Love and Love.

The Habit of Perfection

Elected Silence, sing to me

And beat upon my whorlèd 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 makes you eloquent.

Be shellèd, 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-coloured clothes provide

Your spouse not laboured-at nor spun.

Heaven–Haven

A nun takes the veil

I have desired to go

Where springs not fail,

To fields where flies no sharp and sided hail

And a few lilies blow.

And I have asked to be

Where no storms come,

Where the green swell is in the havens dumb,

And out of the swing of the sea.