The Project Gutenberg eBook of Poems of Adoration

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Title: Poems of Adoration

Author: Michael Field

Release date: January 1, 2020 [eBook #61070]
Most recently updated: October 17, 2024

Language: English

Credits: Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
produced from images generously made available by The
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POEMS OF ADORATION ***

 

 

 

POEMS OF ADORATION

POEMS OF ADORATION
BY
MICHAEL FIELD

SANDS & CO. LONDON & EDINBURGH

 

 

CONTENTS

POEMS OF ADORATION

 PAGE
DESOLATION1
ENTBEHREN SOLLST DU3
FREGIT5
SICUT PARVULI6
AURUM, THUS, ET MYRRHA—ALLELUIA!7
HOLY COMMUNION8
OF SILENCE9
REAL PRESENCE11
FROM THE HIGHWAY13
“THAT HE SHOULD TASTE DEATH FOR EVERY MAN”14
NIMIS HONORATI SUNT16
BLESSED ARE THE BEGGARS17
THE BLESSED SACRAMENT19
THE BLESSED SACRAMENT20
 
COLUMBA MEA22
VIRGO POTENS23
ANOTHER LEADETH THEE25
THE GARDEN OF LAZARUS28
HOLY CROSS30
PURGATORY31
FORTITUDO EGENIS32
PAX VOBISCUM33
PURISSIMÆ VIRGINI SACELLUM34
IN THE BEGINNING36
AN ANTIPHONY OF ADVENT37
ANNUNCIATIONS40
STONES OF THE BROOK41
RELICS43
ON CAUCASUS47
IN THE SEA49
... JOANNIS ET PAULI”52
IN MONTE FANNO55
MACRINUS AGAINST TREES57
PASCHAL’S MASS59
A SNOW-CAVE61
PROPHET63
LOOKING UPON JESUS AS HE WALKED65
A DANCE OF DEATH67
OBEDIENCE71
GARDENS ENCLOSED72
GARDEN-SEED73
UNIVERSA COHORS74
IN EXTREMIS76
A LIGNO78
ONE REED80
CRYING OUT81
AD MORTEM83
THE FLOWER FADETH85
FEAR NOT87
RECOGNITION88
VENIT JESUS89
ASCENSION90
CONFLUENCE91
IMPLE SUPERNA GRATIA92
WORDS OF THE BRIDEGROOM93
A MAGIC MIRROR94
DESCENT FROM THE CROSS96
UNSURPASSED99
WASTING101
THE HOUR OF NEED102
EXTREME UNCTION103
AFTER ANOINTING105
VIATICUM106
A GIFT OF SWEETNESS108
IN CHRISTO109
SIGHTS FOR GOD110
TRANSIT113

 

 

DESOLATION

WHO comes?...
 O Beautiful!
 Low thunder thrums,
 As if a chorus struck its shawms and drums.
 The sun runs forth
 To stare at Him, who journeys north
 From Edom, from the lonely sands, arrayed
 In vesture sanguine as at Bosra made.
 O beautiful and whole,
 In that red stole!
Behold,
 O clustered grapes,
 His garment rolled,
 And wrung about His waist in fold on fold!
 See, there is blood
 Now on His garment, vest and hood;
 For He hath leapt upon a loaded vat,
 And round His motion splashes the wine-fat,
 Though there is none to play
 The Vintage-lay.
The Word
 Of God, His name ...
 But nothing heard
 Save beat of His lone feet forever stirred
 To tread the press—
 None with Him in His loneliness;
 No treader with Him in the spume, no man.
His flesh shows dusk with wine: since He began
 He hath not stayed, that forth may pour
 The Vineyard’s store.
He treads
 The angry grapes ...
 Their anger spreads,
 And all its brangling passion sheds
 In blood. O God,
 Thy wrath, Thy wine-press He hath trod—
 The fume, the carnage, and the murderous heat!
 Yet all is changed by patience of the feet:
 The blood sinks down; the vine
 Is issued wine.
O task
 Of sacrifice,
 That we may bask
 In clemency and keep an undreamt Pasch!
 O Treader lone,
 How pitiful Thy shadow thrown
 Athwart the lake of wine that Thou hast made!
 O Thou, most desolate, with limbs that wade
 Among the berries, dark and wet,
 Thee we forget!

ENTBEHREN SOLLST DU

’Neath the Garden of Gethsemane’s
 Olive-wood,
 Thou didst cast Thy will away from Thee
 In Thy blood.
Through the shade, when torches spat their light,
 And arms shone,
 Thou didst find Thy lovers and Thy friends
 Were all gone.
In the Judgment Hall, Thy hands and feet
 Bound with cord,
 Thou didst lose Thy freedom’s sweetness—all
 Thy freedom, Lord.
In the Soldiers’ Hall, Thy Sovereignty
 Laughed to naught,
 Thou wert scourged, Thy brow by bramble-wreath
 Sharply caught.
Stripped of vest and garments Thou didst lie,
 Mid hill-moss,
 Naked, helpless as a nurse’s child,
 On Thy cross.
Raised, Thou gavest to another son,
 Standing by,
 Her who bore Thee once, and, deep in pain,
 Watched Thee die.
All was cast away from Thee; and then,
 With wild drouth,
 “Why dost Thou forsake me, Father?” broke
 From Thy mouth.
Everything gone from Thee, even daylight;
 None to trust;
 Thou didst render up Thy holy Life
 To the dust.
Help me, from my passion, to recall
 Thy sheer loss,
 And adore the sovereign nakedness
 Of Thy Cross!

FREGIT

ON the night of dedication
 Of Thyself as our oblation,
 Christ, Belovèd, Thou didst take
 In Thy very hands and break....
O my God, there is the hiss of doom
 When new-glowing flowers are snapt in bloom;
 When shivered, as a little thunder-cloud,
 A vase splits on the floor its brilliance loud;
 Or lightning strikes a willow-tree with gash
 Cloven for death in a resounded crash;
 And I have heard that one who could betray
 His country and yet face the breadth of day,
 Bowed himself, weeping, but to hear his sword
 Broken before him, as his sin’s award.
 These were broken; Thou didst break....
Thou the Flower that Heaven did make
 Of our race the crown of light;
 Thou the Vase of Chrysolite
 Into which God’s balm doth flow;
 Thou the Willow hung with woe
 Of our exile harps; Thou Sword
 Of the Everlasting Word—
 Thou, betrayed, Thyself didst break
 Thy own Body for our sake:
 Thy own Body Thou didst take
 In Thy holy hands—and break.

SICUT PARVULI

WITH me, laid upon my tongue,
 As upon Thy Mother’s knee
 Thou wert laid at Thy Nativity;
 And she felt Thee lie her wraps among.
Tenderest pressure, dint of grace,
 All she dreamed and loved in God,
 As a shoot from an old Patriarch’s rod,
 Laid upon her, felt by her embrace.
O my God, to have Thee, feel Thee mine,
 In Thy helpless Presence! Love,
 Not to dream of Thee in power above,
 But receive Thee, Little One divine!
As the burthen of a seal
 May give kingdoms with its touch,
 Lo, Thy meek preponderance is such,
 I am straight ennobled as I kneel.
Teach me, tiny Godhead, to adore
 On my flesh Thy tender weight,
 As Thy Mother, bowing, owned how great
 Was the Child that unto us she bore.

AURUM, THUS, ET MYRRHA—ALLELUIA!

O GIFT, O Blessèd Sacrament—my Gold,
 All that I live by royally, the power,
 Like gold, that buys life for me, hour by hour,
 And crowns me with a greatness manifold
 Such that my spirit scarce hath spring to hold
 Its treasure and its sovereignty of dower!
O Blessèd Sacrament—my Frankincense,
 God raised aloft in His Divinity,
 Sweet-smelling as the dry and precious tree,
 That spreads round sacrifice an odour dense,
 Hiding with mystic offering our offence;
 O holy Balm of God that pleads for me!
O Gift, O Blessèd Sacrament—my Myrrh!
 Thou art to die for me—a holy Thing,
 That will preserve my soul from festering,
 Nor may it feel mortality, the stir
 And motion into dust, if Thou confer
 On it Thy bitter strength of cherishing!

HOLY COMMUNION

IN the Beginning—and in me,
 Flesh of my flesh, O Deity,
 Bone of my bone;
 In me alone
 Create, as if on Thy sixth day,
 I, of frail breath and clay,
 Were yet one seed with Thee,
 Engendering Trinity!
My Lord, the honour of great fear
 To be Thy teeming fiat here;
 In blood and will
 Urged to fulfil
 Thy rounded motion of behest;
 One with Thy power and blest
 To act by aim and right
 Of Thy prevenient might!

OF SILENCE

“Be it done unto me
 According to Thy word....”
 Into Mortality
 Slips the Eternal Word,
 When not a sound is heard.
She spake those words, and then
 Was silent in her heart;
 Mother of Silence, when
 Her will spake from her heart
 Her lips had done their part.
And only once we hear
 Her words that intercede;
 Her will so sweetly clear
 Those lips should intercede,
 And help men in their need.
Out of her silence grew
 The Word, and as a man
 He neither cried nor knew
 The strivings of a man,
 When doom for Him began.
And after He had gone
 From Earth to Heaven away,
 He came and lingered on;
 He would not pass away,
 But with His people stay.
Son of the Silent Maid,
 He chose her silence too.
 In dumbness He hath stayed,
 Dumbness unbroken too,
 Past measure—as night-dew.
O quiet, holy Host,
 Our pondering Joy and Light,
 In Thy still power engrossed,
 As a mute star pleads light,
 Thou pleadest, Infinite!

REAL PRESENCE

I APPROACH Thy Altar.... Stay!
 Let me break away!
 Level stones of marble, brazen lights,
 Linen spread, flowers on the shelves and heights—
 I bow down, I kneel ...
 And far away, where the sun sets, would reel!
For from forth Thy altar Thou
 Strikest on me now,
 Strikest on me, firm and warm to thrill,
 With the charm of one whose touch could kill;
 Giving me desire
 Toward substance, yet for flight the lightning’s fire.
So, if close a lover kneels,
 Praying close, one feels
 All the body’s flow of life reined tight,
 As when waters struggle at their height;
 From Thy altar-stone,
 Thou in my body bodily art known.
And I fear Thee worse than death,
 As we fear Love’s breath:
 Thou art as a tiger round a camp;
 And I kindle, terrified, my lamp,
 Since I cannot fly,
 But to hold Thee distant, lest I die.
Thou art God, and in the mesh,
 Close to me, of flesh;
 And we love and we have been in range
 Of wild secrecies of interchange:
 Could I bear Thee near
 I should be humble to Thee—but I fear!

FROM THE HIGHWAY

KING of Kings, Thou comest down the street
 To my door ...
 As from ankles of the heavenly feet
 Of wild angels, tinkling pedals sweet,
 And sweet bells;
 As if water-carriers from bright wells
 Jangled freshets to a dewless land,
 Thou art called upon the air,
 As Thou mountest to me, stair by stair:
 In my presence Thou dost stand,
 And Thou comest to me on my bed....
 Lord, I live and am not dead!
 I should be dead—
 I, a sinner! And Thou comest swift....
 Woe, to wake such love to roam about,
 Wandering the street to find me out,
 Bringing wholesome balm for gift,
 As, in contrariety,
 Come to Magdalen, not she,
 O Pure, to Thee!

“THAT HE SHOULD TASTE DEATH FOR EVERY MAN”

IN all things Thou art like us and content,
 Bowing, receiv’st Thy sacrament.
 What is it?—that Thou kneelest meek?
 And what the gift that Thou dost seek
 Beside us at Thy altars? Hour by hour,
 What is it lays up in Thee holy power?
 Christ, if Thou comest suppliant
 It is to Death, the Celebrant!
 Death gives the wafer of his dust;
 The ashes of his harvest thrust
 Upon Thy tongue Thou tastest, then
 Dost swallow for the sake of men.
 O Brightness of the Heavens, to save
 Thy creatures Thou dost eat the grave!
Our Sacrament—oh, generous!—of wheat,
 The dust that out of corn we eat,
 Whiteness of Life’s fair grain! O Christ,
 No grinding of the cornfield had sufficed
 To lay upon our tongues Thy holy Bread,
 Unless Thou hadst Thyself so harshly fed
 With grindings of the bone of death, the grit
 That once was beauty and the form of it;
 Once welcome, now so sharp to taste;
 Once featured, now the dregs of waste;
 Of hope once filled, now lacking aught
 Of treasure to be sold or bought—
Dust of our substance Thou each day
 Dost taste of in its fated clay....
 O soul, take thought! It is thy God
 That to His lips presses this choking sod!

NIMIS HONORATI SUNT

“Cast not your pearls down before swine!”
 The words are Thine!—
 Listen, cast not
 The treasure of a white sea-grot,
 An uncontaminate, round loveliness,
 A pearl of ocean-waters fathomless,
 A secret of exceeding, cherished light,
 A dream withdrawn from evening infinite,
 A beauty God gave silence to—cast not
 This wealth from treasury of Indian seas,
 Or Persian fisheries,
 Down in the miry dens that clot
 The feet of swine, who trample, hide and blot.
To us Thy words!... But, see,
 In Thy idolatry
 Of us, all thought
 Of counsel fails and falls to nought!
 Pearl of Great Price, within the monstrance set,
 Why wilt Thou for Thyself Thy charge forget?
 O Love, from deeps before the world began,
 O Sheltered of God’s Bosom, why for man
 Wilt Thou so madly in the slough be cast,
 Concealed ’mid tramplings and disgrace of swine?
 O Host, O White, Benign!
 Why spend in rage of love at last
 Thy wisdom all eternity amassed?

BLESSED ARE THE BEGGARS Matt. v. 3

I

TAKE me along with thee, O blessed, seeking one!
 Take me along with thee! Thou art not poor;
 Arimathea doth thy wealth immure;
 Thou hast a garden in the country sun;
 Thou hast a new, clean-chiselled grave awaits thee,
 A grave, self-chosen, neither low nor narrow;
 And thou couldst bring excess of myrrh and aloe
 As gift where thou dost love,
 If thou thy love wouldst prove:
 Yet must thou beg. A beggar Pilate rates thee,
 Coming to beg the body of thy Lord,
 Cast from the Cross by men, of thee adored.[A]

[A] “This man went unto Pilate, and begged the body of Jesus.”—Luke xxiii. 52.

II

TAKE me along with thee, and let me learn thy prayer!
 Take me along with thee! I must prevail.
 For all that I possess is void and stale
 Unless I have God’s Body in my care.
 Kneeling together, make for both petition!
 Only upon our knees shall we receive Him,
 Only by importunity achieve Him,
 And crying with one need.
 Prompt in thy grace, give heed!
 I am a beggar of thy wild condition:
 I huddle to thy side, my hope is thine,
 Thy will my will—His Body must be mine.

THE BLESSED SACRAMENT