ST. AGNES' EVE Deep on the convent-roof the snows The shadows of the convent-towers Still creeping with the creeping hours Make Thou my spirit pure and clear Or this first snowdrop of the year As these white robes are soil'd and dark As this pale taper's earthly spark, To yonder argent round; So shows my soul before the Lamb, So in mine earthly house I am, To that I hope to be. Break up the heavens, O Lord! and far, Draw me, Thy bride, a glittering star, He lifts me to the golden doors; And deepens on and up! the gates For me the Heavenly Bridegroom waits, The sabbaths of Eternity, One sabbath deep and wide A light upon the shining sea Alfred Tennyson Matthew Arnold, Born 1822 December the Twenty-fourth George Crabbe, Born 1754 PREPARATIONS Yet if His Majesty, our sovereign lord, Should of his own accord Friendly himself invite, And say, "I'll be your guest to-morrow night," "Set me fine Spanish tables in the hall; See they be fitted all; Let there be room to eat And order taken that there want no meat. "Look to the presence: are the carpets spread, The dazie o'er the head, The cushions in the chairs, And all the candles lighted on the stairs? Let each man give attendance in his place!" Thus, if a king were coming, would we do; For 'tis a duteous thing To show all honour to an earthly king, So he be pleased, to think no labour lost. But at the coming of the King of Heaven We wallow in our sin, Christ cannot find a chamber in the inn. Christ Church MS. (About 1600) THE BURNING BABE As I in hoary winter's night Who, scorched with excessive heat, As though His floods should quench His Which with His tears were bred: "Alas!" quoth He, "but newly born In fiery heats I fry, Yet none approach to warm their hearts "My faultless breast the furnace is; The fuel Justice layeth on, And Mercy blows the coals, Are men's defilèd souls: For which, as now on fire I am So will I melt into a bath, To wash them in my blood." And straight I called unto mind Robert Southwell A MYSTICAL ECSTASY E'en like two little bank-dividing brooks, That wash the pebbles with their wanton streams, And having ranged and search'd a thousand nooks, Meet both at length in silver-breasted Thames, Where in a greater current they conjoin: So I my Best-Beloved's am; so He is mine. E'en so we met; and after long pursuit, E'en so we join'd; we both became entire; No need for either to renew a suit, For I was flax and he was flames of fire: Our firm united souls did more than twine; So I my Best-Belovèd's am; so He is mine. If all those glittering Monarchs that command Francis Quarles COME NOT, WHEN I AM DEAD Come not, when I am dead, To drop thy foolish tears upon my grave, To trample round my fallen head, And vex the unhappy dust thou wouldst not save. There let the wind sweep and the plover cry; But thou, go by. Child, if it were thine error or thy crime I care no longer, being all unblest: Wed whom thou wilt, but I am sick of Time, And I desire to rest. Pass on, weak heart, and leave me where I lie: Go by, go by. Alfred Tennyson SONG When I am dead, my dearest, I shall not see the shadows, And dreaming through the twilight That doth not rise nor set, Haply I may remember, And haply may forget. Christina Georgina Rossetti THE WANDERER Love comes back to his vacant dwelling- With his great eyes sad, and his bosom swelling. He makes as though in our arms repelling Ah, who shall help us from over-spelling Austin Dobson |