Nicholson & Lee, eds. The Oxford Book of English Mystical Verse. 1917. |
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265. Christ in the Universe |
By Alice Meynell (b. 1847) |
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WITH this ambiguous earth | |
His dealings have been told us. These abide: | |
The signal to a maid, the human birth, | |
The lesson, and the young Man crucified. | |
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But not a star of all | 5 |
The innumerable host of stars has heard | |
How He administered this terrestrial ball. | |
Our race have kept their Lords entrusted Word. | |
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Of His earth-visiting feet | |
None knows the secret, cherished, perilous, | 10 |
The terrible, shamefast, frightened, whispered, sweet, | |
Heart-shattering secret of His way with us. | |
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No planet knows that this | |
Our wayside planet, carrying land and wave, | |
Love and life multiplied, and pain and bliss, | 15 |
Bears, as chief treasure, one forsaken grave. | |
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Nor, in our little day, | |
May His devices with the heavens be guessed, | |
His pilgrimage to thread the Milky Way | |
Or His bestowals there be manifest. | 20 |
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But in the eternities, | |
Doubtless we shall compare together, hear | |
A million alien Gospels, in what guise | |
He trod the Pleiades, the Lyre, the Bear. | |
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O, be prepared, my soul! | 25 |
To read the inconceivable, to scan | |
The myriad forms of God those stars unroll | |
When, in our turn, we show to them a Man. | |
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