Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

MY SAINT, by                    
First Line: My arms are empty, and my eyes
Last Line: And whisper masses for the dead.
Subject(s): Clergy; Memory; Prayer; Saints; Worship; Priests; Rabbis; Ministers; Bishops


MY arms are empty, and my eyes,
That cannot see her little face,
Look on the world in dull surprise
To find it such a dreary place.

What wonder that her rosy feet
Turned from the earthly path they trod,
Faltered, and found the starry street,
The rainbow way that leads to God?

With smiling lips she tried to frame
A word of parting or of prayer
They only dimpled to my name,
And smiled again, and rested there.

Within the hollow of my breast,
Where once my heart beat fervently,
A chapel I have reared and blest
And there enshrined her memory.

Only white thoughts may enter here,
To scatter incense sweet and faint,
Kneel with the priest who worships near,
Or serve the altar of my saint.

Love is the priest, and night and day,
With folded wings and drooping head,
He kneels before the shrine to pray,
And whisper masses for the dead.





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