Deus Absconditus
SINCE Thou dost clothe Thyself to-day in cloud,
Lord God in heaven, and no voice low or loud
Proclaims Thee,--see, I turn me to the Earth,
Its wisdom and its sorrow and its mirth,
Thy Earth perchance, but sure my very own,
And precious to me grows the clod, the stone,
A voiceless moor's brooding monotony,
A keen star quivering through the sunset dye,
Young wrinkled beech leaves, saturate with light,
The arching wave's suspended malachite;
I turn to men, Thy sons perchance, but sure
My brethren, and no face shall be too poor
To yield me some unquestionable gain
Of wonder, laughter, loathing, pity, pain,
Some dog-like craving caught in human eyes,
Some new-wak'd spirit's April ecstasies;
These will not fail nor foil me; while I live
There will be actual truck in take and give,
But Thou hast foil'd me; therefore undistraught,
I cease from seeking what will not be sought,
[...] Read more
poem by Edward Dowden
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
The Initiation
UNDER the flaming wings of cherubim
I moved toward that high altar. O, the hour!
And the light waxed intenser, and the dim
Low edges of the hills and the grey sea
Were caught and captur’d by the present Power,
My sureties and my witnesses to be.
Then the light drew me in. Ah, perfect pain!
Ah, infinite moment of accomplishment!
Thou terror of pure joy, with neither wane
Nor waxing, but long silence and sharp air
As womb-forsaking babes breathe. Hush! the event
Let him who wrought Love’s marvellous things declare.
Shall I who fear’d not joy, fear grief at all?
I on whose mouth Life laid his sudden lips
Tremble at Death’s weak kiss, and not recall
That sundering from the flesh, the flight from time,
The judgements stern, the clear apocalypse,
The lightnings, and the Presences sublime.
[...] Read more
poem by Edward Dowden
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
First Love
My long first year of perfect love,
My deep new dream of joy; She was a little chubby girl,
I was a chubby boy.
I wore a crimson frock, white drawers,
A belt, a crown was on it;
She wore some angel's kind of dress
And such a tiny bonnet,
Old-fashioned, but the soft brown hair Would never keep its place;
A little maid with violet eyes,
And sunshine in her face.
O my child-queen, in those lost days
How sweet was daily living!
How humble and how proud I grew,
How rich by merely giving!
She went to school, the parlour-maid
Slow stepping to her trot;
[...] Read more
poem by Edward Dowden
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
The Secret of the Universe
AN ODE
(By a Western Spinning Dervish)
I SPIN, I spin, around, around,
And close my eyes,
And let the bile arise
From the sacred region of the soul’s Profound;
Then gaze upon the world; how strange! how new!
The earth and heaven are one,
The horizon-line is gone,
The sky how green! the land how fair and blue!
Perplexing items fade from my large view,
And thought which vexed me with its false and true
Is swallowed up in Intuition; this,
This is the sole true mode
Of reaching God,
And gaining the universal synthesis
Which makes All—One; while fools with peering eyes
Dissect, divide, and vainly analyse.
[...] Read more
poem by Edward Dowden
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
In the Cathedral Close
IN the Dean's porch a nest of clay
With five small tentants may be seen;
Five solemn faces, each as wise
As if its owner were a Dean.
Five downy fledglings in a row,
Packed close, as in the antique pew
The school-girls are whose foreheads clear
At the Venite shine on you.
Day after day the swallows sit
With scarce a stir, with scarce a sound,
But dreaming and digesting much
They grow thus wise and soft and round:
They watch the Canons come to dine,
And hear, the mullion-bars across,
Over the fragrant fruit and wine
Deep talk of rood-screen and reredos.
[...] Read more
poem by Edward Dowden
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
By the Window
STILL deep into the West I gazed; the light
Clear, spiritual, tranquil as a bird
Wide-winged that soars on the smooth gale and sleeps,
Was it from sun far-set or moon unrisen?
Whether from moon, or sun, or angel’s face
It held my heart from motion, stayed my blood,
Betrayed each rising thought to quiet death
Along the blind charm’d way to nothingness,
Lull’d the last nerve that ached. It was a sky
Made for a man to waste his will upon,
To be received as wiser than all toil,
And much more fair. And what was strife of men?
And what was time?
Then came a certain thing.
Are intimations for the elected soul
Dubious, obscure, of unauthentic power
Since ghostly to the intellectual eye,
Shapeless to thinking? Nay, but are not we
Servile to words and an usurping brain,
[...] Read more
poem by Edward Dowden
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!