Faith, Spirituality and Religion

Lord, hear me out, and hear me out this day: From me to Thee’s a long and terrible way.

Brooding on God, I may become a man. Pain wanders through my bones like a lost fire; What burns me now? Desire, desire, desire.

If thou must choose Between the chances, choose the odd; Read the New Yorker; trust in God; And take short views.

Listen, Christ, You did alright in your day, I reckon— But that day’s gone now. They ghosted you up a swell story, too, Called it Bible— But it’s dead now.

George Brush is my name America’s my nation Luddington’s my dwelling place And Heaven’s my destination.

In this most Christian of worlds

And we all go with them, into the silent funeral, Nobody’s funeral, for there is no one to bury. I said to my soul, be still, 8 and let the dark come upon you Which shall be the darkness of God.

Saint and Martyr rule from the tomb.

Against the Word the unstilled world still whirled About the center of the silent Word.

Upon the glazen shelves kept watch Matthew and Waldo, guardians of the faith, The army of unalterable law.

Now, God be thanked, Who has matched us with His hour, And caught our youth, and wakened us from sleeping.

We say God and the imagination are one… How high that highest candle lights the dark. 1

The death of one god is the death of all.

Susanna’s music touched the bawdy strings Of those white elders; but, escaping, Left only Death’s ironic scraping. Now, in its immortality, it plays On the clear viol of her memory, And makes a constant sacrament of praise.

Forgive, O Lord, my little jokes on Thee And I’ll forgive Thy great big one on me.

Locke sank into a swoon; The Garden died; God took the spinning-jenny Out of his side.

Odor of blood when Christ was slain Made all Platonic tolerance vain And vain all Doric discipline.

The soul recovers radical innocence And learns at last that it is self-delighting, Self-appeasing, self-affrighting, And that its own sweet will is Heaven’s will.

Oh, Adam was a gardener, and God who made him sees That half a proper gardener’s work is done upon his knees.

For frantic boast and foolish word— Thy mercy on Thy People, Lord!

God of our fathers, known of old, Lord of our far-flung battle line, Beneath whose awful Hand we hold Dominion over palm and pine— Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet, Lest we forget—lest we forget!

If I were damned of body and soul, I know whose prayers would make me whole, Mother o’ mine, O mother o’ mine.

World-mothering air, air wild, Wound with thee, in thee isled, Fold home, fast fold thy child.

I say that we are wound With mercy round and round As if with air.