In A Monastery Garden
OVER the long salt ridges
And the gold sea-poppies between,
They builded them wild-briar hedges,
A church and a cloistered green.
And when they were done with their praises,
And the tides on the Fore beat slow,
Under the white cliff-daisies
They laid them down in a row.
Porphyry, Paul, and Peter,
Jasper, and Joachim,–
Was the psaltery music sweeter
Than the throat of the thrush to him ?
Tired of their drones and their dirges,
Where the young cliff-rabbits play,
Wet with the salt of the surges,
They laid them down for a day.
One may not call to the other
There on the rim of the deep,
[...] Read more
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Bega
FROM the clouded belfry calling,
Hear my soft ascending swells;
Hear my notes like swallows falling;
I am Bega, least of bells.
When great Turkeful rolls and rings
All the storm-touched turret swings,
Echoing battle, loud and long.
When great Tatwin wakening roars
To the far-off shining shores,
All the seamen know his song.
I am Bega, least of bells:
In my throat my message swells.
I with all the winds a-thrill,
Murmuring softly, murmuring still,
'God around me, God above me,
God to guard me, God to love me.'
I am Bega, least of bells,
Weaving wonder, wind-born spells.
High above the morning mist,
[...] Read more
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Evening
WHEN the white iris folds the drowsing bee,
When the first cricket wakes
The fairy hosts of his enchanted brakes,
When the dark moth has sought the lilac tree,
And the young stars, like jasmine of the skies,
Are opening on the silence, Lord, there lies
Dew on Thy rose and dream upon mine eyes.
Lovely the day, when life is robed in splendour,
Walking the ways of God and strong with wine,
But the pale eve is wonderful and tender,
And night is more divine.
Fold my faint olives from their shimmering plain,
O shadow of sweet darkness fringed with rain.
Give me to night again.
Give me to day no more. I have bethought me
Silence is more than laughter, sleep than tears.
Sleep like a lover faithfully hath sought me
Down the enduring years.
[...] Read more
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
The Hillman’s Lass
OVER the field where the grass is cool,
(Follow the road who must !)
With a song for the beech and the brown pool,
And the noiseless tread in the dust,
With a laugh for the lazy hours that go,
And the folk who pass us by.
(The trees they grow so broad, so low,
They shut me from the sky.)
Here be strawberries wild and sweet,
(Follow the road who may !)
And here's a rest for a bairn's feet
And a kiss at the close o' day.
And here's a cloud from the shining sea
Like a white moth in the night.
(On the edge o' the barley field, may be
The stars would show more bright.)
Cut me a flute where the reeds are brown.
(Follow the road who will !)
[...] Read more
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Armorel
WHEN within the rippling tide
Shakes the silver-pointed moon,
When the rainbow flies of noon
All have died,
When the bats go wheeling far,
And the mournful owl has cried
Twice or thrice a-down the glen
Gray with gathering shade, and when
Gates o' dream are held ajar,–
From the alders in the dell,
From the bracken fronds astir,
Elfin voices call to her,–
'Armorel !'
She shall glide the garden down,
Treading softly, treading slow,
And with silent feet shall go
Past the Mary-lilies white,
Past the pansies, gold and brown,
Grown for her delight.
[...] Read more
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
For All Prisoners And Captives
OVER the English trees and the English meadows
Twilight is falling clear,
But my heart walks far in the homeless winds and the shadows
For those who are not here.
Youth and pleasure and peace and the strong flesh clothing
The freeman's soul, they gave;
Beauty they gave for a scar and honour for loathing
And life for a living grave.
But not of the least they gave was the English, mellow
Sunlight on beech leaves spread,
And the Squirrel flickering earthward to find his fellow
Where the chestnut husks lie dead.
And not of the least they lost was the calm star climbing
Over the elm tree's height,
And the heron high in the mists, and the hoar frost riming
The ivy leaves at night.
[...] Read more
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Jasper’s Song
WHO goes down through the slim green sallows,
Soon, so soon ?
Dawn is hard on the heels of the moon,
But never a lily the day-star knows
Is white, so white as the one who goes
Armed and shod, when the hyacinths darken.
Then hark, O harken !
And rouse the moths from the deep rose-mallows,
Call the wild hares down from the fallows,
Gather the silk of the young sea-poppies,
The bloom of the thistle, the bells of the foam;
Bind them all with a brown owl's feather,
Snare the winds in a golden tether,
Chase the clouds from the gipsy's weather, and follow, O follow, the white spring home.
Who goes past with the wind that chilled us,
Late, so late ?
Fortune leans on the farmer's gate,
Watching the round sun low in the south,
With a plume in his cap and a rose at his mouth.
[...] Read more
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
The Lamp of Poor Souls
[In many English churches before the Reformation there was kept a little lamp continually burning, called the Lamp of Poor Souls. People were reminded thereby to pray for the souls of those dead whose kinsfolk were too poor to pay for prayers and masses.]
Above my head the shields are stained with rust,
The wind has taken his spoil, the moth his part;
Dust of dead men beneath my knees, and dust,
Lord, in my heart.
Lay Thou the hand of faith upon my fears;
The priest has prayed, the silver bell has rung,
But not for him. O unforgotten tears,
He was so young!
Shine, little lamp, nor let thy light grow dim.
Into what vast, dread dreams, what lonely lands,
Into what griefs hath death delivered him,
Far from my hands?
Cradled is he, with half his prayers forgot.
I cannot learn the level way he goes.
[...] Read more
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Singing Children
IN the streets of Bethlehem sang the children
So merry and so shrill,
'He shall have sweet cedars in his garden
And a house on Hermon Hill.
He shall have the king's daughter for his fellow,
A king's crown to bind upon his head.'
And with bracken buds and straw, brown and yellow,
Mary made His bed.
In the streets of Nazareth sang the children
So clearly and so sweet,
'He shall lead us to the spoiling of the nations,
He shall bruise them with his feet.
His standards shall outface the stars for number,
Red as field-lilies when the rains are done.'
And Mary heard them singing in her slumber.
And woke to kiss her Son.
In the streets of Jerusalem the children
Sang, passing to their play,
[...] Read more
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Fame
HAVE I played fellowship with night, to see
The allied armies break our gates at dawn
And let our general in ? By Bacchus, no !
I have not left my stall, sir, I'm too poor
For lazy prentices to hand my wares,–
Such delicate chains, like amber linked with love !
Such silvered pins, like hate to let love out !–
What know I ? But my Guidarello went
To the fountain of the coppersmiths, when first
The double cypress showed upon the east.
He's home, poor fool, hoarse as a moulting bird
From loud throat-loyalty.
'The banners burn
Still in my soul,' he cries, 'as then in air.
The gray air, the gray houses, and the flowers,
The flowers, my father! Thyme and twisted sweets
From the blue hills I dream of, and thin bells
Of faery folds; pomegranates spun in flame,
Flame of red rose and golden, flame of sound
Blown from hot-throated trumpets, and the flame
[...] Read more
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!