Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE CAMBRIDGE SCHOOL, by PERCY STICKNEY GRANT


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE CAMBRIDGE SCHOOL, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Elm-shaded town where poets thrive
Last Line: When love serves truth, and truth serves love.
Subject(s): Episcopal Theological School, Cambridge


I

THE PLACE.

Elm-shaded town where poets thrive,
And life is thought or laureled song;
Strife hushed except when ideals strive,
Far from rough contact with the throng!

Broad meadows, tall groves famed for birds,
Still streets where brooding scholars walk,
Plain buildings, shrines of deathless words,
Small homes, fond scene of fruitful talk!

I've stopped and looked across you wall,
On graves whose names will always thrill,
Of Minute-men, at Freedom's call
Who died for us, ere Bunker Hill.

Ah! here, indeed, is holy ground!
Stern school of new apostolate!
Where Freedom lives, there Truth is found;
Near heroes' graves, men should be great.

Here nature, mind and art unite
To mix the air you come to breathe,
Who love mankind, grieve at its plight,
And seek those cures the saints bequeath.

Where once the rough-hewn stockade stood,
That walled our sires from savage foes,
Then, crumbling, ran to willow-wood,
Here, for God's use, these halls arose.

II

THE PRIEST.

In days when mind and men are free,
When superstition has decreased,
And business bustles charity,
What need of church? What place for priest?

His aim is not what Mather sought,
Whose pulpit ruled o'er Justice's head;
Who harried minds diseased, distraught,
And goaded souls Christ would have led.

Nor his who through May-lilacs gazed, --
With Jove-like head, sweet, sound, serene, --
And dreamed the Indians' dreams and raised
Weird woods that sighed "Evangeline."

His place is not with him who guessed
From Alpine drifts a glacial age;
Who coaxed us back to nature's breast,
Great teacher, genial leader, sage.

He is impatient of all tasks
That hold him from his fellow's side;
Would give his life, and only asks
It bless mankind as when Christ died.

He sees the laborer walk from work,
'Neath bundled, refuse wood still bent.
His heart goes with him to the murk
Called home in some foul tenement.

The coat, patched on the shoulder, tells
Loads he has borne and still will bear.
He loves his haste, laugh, dirt, pipe-smells
And form refined by slender fare.

Where pain is found, there he is found, --
His pleasure to bring pain release:
Where sin, shame or despair abound,
He hungers to speak pardon, peace.

His visions mingle with men's deeds;
Mould sculptors' clay, halt feet that err,
Give souls to bodies, worth to weeds: --
Heaven's priest, but earth's interpreter.

III

TRUTH.

Little you taught to be unlearned,
By wider study, deeper thought.
Your flame our mental stubble burned,
And left what mind and conscience wrought.

For truth is what unfetters mind;
Emboldens bosoms, builds the soul.
What makes man to his fellows kind,
And in composure sees life whole.

No Jacob's ladder, -- that a dream --
Connects bare heavens with flowering earth.
On every street divine steps gleam;
For God is born in every birth.

Whose eyes have seen life burst the grave,
And soul unfold when flesh decays;
Beheld the smile that spirits have,
Who turn to us from heavenly ways.

Who looks at men with their deep eyes,
In every one a God can see.
His soul has entered Paradise;
He lives in immortality.

IV

THE TIMES.

Christ's name resounds in Gothic aisles,
In creed, in hymn, in sacrament.
His cross is worn in many styles.
Are Christ's gifts to His followers spent?

Tenacious of the form and name,
Obtuse to truth concealed within,
Monopoly of Christ we claim,
Yet still are sick, and still will sin.

Still women sell their souls for food,
And children waste their bloom in toil,
Still power drains its plenitude,
And plows the poor, -- still fertile soil.

When men indifferent turn away,
And lightly live as fay or elf,
Heedless of God or man and say
"He helps the world who helps himself."

We whine: "The cold world has no heart,
We work unpraised, we work alone."
Discouraged give up man for art,
Then slave to please those hearts of stone.

We burden memory, shackle mind,
Hold genius back and scare the brave,
Make truth half-falsehood, progress bind,
At ghostly voices from the grave.

When knowledge broadening looks askance
At older stores -- religion's prize --
We know its wealth will but enhance
Our spirit's worth, creation's size.

But when the church fears God revealed,
In other forms than in one man:
And sees no heaven where races kneeled
Who reverenced God's less baffled plan.

We turn impatient from the dark,
Of quaking hearts and little minds;
We turn and worship that bright spark
That love in every creature finds.

We leave the past; its guess, its heap
Of waste picked o'er, its falsehood taught.
Its heroes, beauty? Yes, we keep
Enshrined in life, in soul inwrought.

We sadly leave the past, like Ruth, --
Whose home was love, for well we know
Religion can be naught but truth,
And fear and falsehood naught but woe.

Splendid the hope confronts the hour!
Both mind and heart must creeds approve.
O Christ thy church will lack no power,
When love serves truth, and truth serves love.





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