May Carols Part 14

Self-sentenced Babel's strife of tongues!

Loud rings the arena. Athletes, peace!

Nor drown the wild-dove's Song of Songs.

Alas, the wanderers feel their loss: With tears they seek--ah, seldom found-- That peace whose volume is the Cross; That peace which leaves not holy ground.

Mary, who loves true peace loves thee!

A happy child, not taught of Scribes, He stands beside the Church's knee; From her the lore of Christ imbibes.

Hourly he drinks it from her face: For there his eyes, he knows not how, The face of Him she loves can trace, And, crowned with thorns, the sovereign brow.

"Behold! all colours blend in white!

Behold! all Truths have root in Love!"

So sings, half lost in light of light, Her Song of Songs the mystic Dove.

{87}

_Sedes Sapientiae._

V.

"Wisdom hath built herself a House, And hewn her out her pillars seven." [Footnote 4]

Her wine is mixed. Her guests are those Who share the harvest-home of heaven.

[Footnote 4: Proverbs ix. 1.]

Who guards the gates? The flaming sword Of Penance. Every way it turns: But healing from on high is poured On each that fire seraphic burns.

The fruits upon her table piled Are gathered from the Tree of Life.

Around are ranged the undefiled, And those that conquered in the strife.

Who tends the guests? Who smiles away Sad memories? bids misgiving cease?

A crowned one countenanced like the day-- The Mother of the Prince of Peace.

{88}

VI.

Here, in this paradise of light, Superfluous were both tree and gra.s.s: Enough to watch the sunbeams smite Yon white flower sole in the mora.s.s.

From his cold nest the skylark springs; Sings, pauses, sings; shoots up anew; Attains his topmost height, and sings Quiescent in his vault of blue.

With eyes half-closed I watch that lake Flashed from whose plane the sun-sparks fly, Like souls new-born that shoot and break From thy deep sea, Eternity!

Ripplings of sunlight from the wave Ascend the white rock, high and higher; Soft gurglings fill the satiate cave; Soft airs amid the reeds expire.

All round the lone and luminous meer The dark world stretches, far and free: That skylark's song alone I hear; That flas.h.i.+ng wave alone I see.

O myriad Earth! Where'er thy Word Makes way indeed into the soul, An answering echo there is stirred:-- Of thee the part is as the whole.

{89}

_Fest. B.V.M. de Monte Carmelo._

VII.

Carmel, with Alp and Apennine, Low whispers in the wind that blows Beneath the Eastern stars, ere s.h.i.+ne The lights of morning on their snows.

Of thee, Elias, Carmel speaks, And that white cloud, so small at first, Thou saw'st approach the mountain peaks To quench a dying nation's thirst.

On Carmel, like a sheathed sword, Thy monks abode till Jesus came; On Carmel then they served their Lord;-- Then Carmel rang with Mary's name.

Blow over all the garden; blow O'er all the garden of the West, Balm-breathing Orient! Whisper low The secret of thy spicy nest.

{90}

"Who from the Desert upward moves Like cloud of incense onward borne?

Who, moving, rests on Him she loves?

Who mounts from regions of the Morn?

"Behold! The apple-tree beneath-- There where of old thy Mother fell-- I raised thee up. More strong than Death Is Love;--more strong than Death or h.e.l.l." [Footnote 5]

[Footnote 5: Cant. viii. 5.]

{91}

VIII.

Come from the midnight mountain tops, The mountains where the panthers play: Descend; the veil of darkness drops; Come fair and fairer than the day!

Our hearts are wounded with thine eyes: They character in words of light Thereon the mystery of the skies: The "Name o'er every name" they write.

Come from thy Lebanonian peaks Whose sacerdotal cedars nod Above the world, when morning breaks-- The Mountain of the House of G.o.d.

The land thou lov'st--well is she!

The ploughers on her back may plough; But in her vales upgrows the Tree Of Life, and binds the bleeding brow.

{92}

_Advocata Nostra._

IX.