Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, A VISION OF SAINTS: S. FRANCIS OF ASSISI, by LEWIS MORRIS (1833-1907)


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

A VISION OF SAINTS: S. FRANCIS OF ASSISI, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: And then it was a saint, still, as it seemed
Last Line: "higher than earthly thrones, a saint in heaven."
Subject(s): Francis Assisi, Saint (1181-1226); Saints


And then it was a saint, still, as it seemed,
Clad in monastic habit, -- many a hand
Of painter limns him -- with dark beard and hair
And melancholy eyes. Full well I knew
The worn ascetic figure, bearing with it
The lily and the lamb; the tearful gaze
Which wept the sad world's sin, while the high voice
Sang praise for all; the poet-monk who lit
Of his seraphic ardour the faint fires
And embers of the Faith. And thus I heard:

"To wealthy Bernardone and his wife,
Madonna Pica, seven long centuries since,
In fair Assisi, on the Umbrian hills,
Was born a son, Giovanni, whom his fellows,
Because he loved the joyous tongue of France,
Would call 'Francesco.' Thence has come a name
Through every Christian realm resounding still,
Beloved for ever, and the ear which hears
'S. Francis of Assisi' knows it takes
A name in which all saintly memories
Are stored as in a precious vase fulfilled
Of spikenard, and the faithful listening soul
Rejoices at its sound and is content.

Now, when the boy had come to youthful years,
Being his father's son, rich in all store
Of gay attire, and filled with pride of life
And luxury, yet would his generous heart
Stand at the gate of pity, prompt to give
If any asked; so that the citizens
Loved the gay, careless youth for all his faults.
Till, when he grew a stripling, a fierce feud
Between Assisi and her sister town
Of high Perugia, raging, burst in war;
And the young Bernardone, with the rest,
Bare arms, and, being taken, twelve long months
Lay prisoner in the fortress. When the strife
Was done and he set free, the burning grasp
Of fever seized him, and he pined long weeks
And months upon his bed. There, as he lay
Hovering 'twixt life and death, his sobered thought
Turned oft to Heaven, and all his reckless youth
Stood up accusing, and a great contempt
For this poor fleeting world and all its joys
Filled his reviving life, and crowned his years
With grave and sudden manhood; and he rose
Leaving his former self, a higher hope
Firing his soul than those low aims of yore.

Yet outwardly he kept his wonted use
Of splendour, and among the admiring throng
Of his dear town he seemed to fare as erst
A glittering youth, though 'neath his costly robe
He bore a painful garment, till one day,
Meeting some poor and humble wayfarer.
He knew a noble comrade who had served
With bravery in the war, leading the van
With glory, but whom now some sudden spite
Of Fortune left a beggar. When he saw
The honoured face seamed with the lines of want
And hunger, and the noble form obscured
By rags and penury, the love of God --
Which is the love of man -- rose up aflame
Within his breast, and hurriedly he stripped
His broidered velvets from him, clothing round
The naked, as his Lord commanded him,
And with the beggar left his purse, and took
His rags, and through the thronged street passed unmoved,
Rapt by an ecstasy of sacrifice,
And gained his home, a beggar in men's sight,
But wealthy in the love of God and man.

Thence ever in his breast the fire of faith
Burned higher, till one day, within the shrine
Of San Damiano praying, where he mourned
The high church half in ruin; as he knelt,
There spake within his soul a voice, which said,
'Build thou My falling Church.' And he who heard,
Deeming it was the ruin where he knelt
The strange voice bade him build, turning in haste
To seek his father's house, sold of their store,
And brought the priests the gold. But when his sire
Was angered for the thing, he fled in fear,
Doubting if he had heard the voice aright,
Which bade him build the Church of God indeed,
Not one poor tottering shrine; and when he came,
After long days, worn, pale, in evil case,
And hungry, all the people deemed the youth
A madman, and his father prisoned him
Within his house long time. But she, his mother,
The mild Madonna Pica, came to him,
And comforted her son, bidding him yield
Obedience to his sire. Yet, though he loved
His gentle mother well, the fire of faith
Burned bright within him, and he spurned the world
And its poor wealth. And when his sire at last,
Being a worlding wholly, summoned him
Before the Bishop, presently his son,
Kneeling before the holy man, flung down
His costly robe, as one who cast away
All worldly wealth, and all the ties of earth,
And gave himself to Heaven. And there he lay
Naked, except his painful vest of hair,
Until the old man, shedding grateful tears
Of tenderness, stooped down and gently raised
The suppliant, and round his young limbs cast
His own white robe; and thenceforth the young life
Died to the world, and lived for Heaven alone.

Thus the swift years passed by and left him, man.
And turning to the sick and leprous lives,
He spent himself in pity; and found peace
In happy daily labour, till his soul
Filled with the bliss of living, and his joy
And thankfulness and praise burst forth in song,
As o'er the sunburned Umbrian hills he fared,
He and his chosen Brother, year by year.
Summer and winter, when the highbuilt town
Glimmered in early dawn, and the thin towers
Gleamed mistlike; or when now a golden rose
Of sunset woke them, as it wakes to-day
His high arcades, his convent cells, where towers,
Leaving the files of sombre cypress-spires,
Church over church; or when the valleys slept
In twilight, and the shrill cicale chirped
Among the olives, and the passionate song
Of nightingales, from every bush and grove,
Throbbed liquid through the gloom; then would his voice
Rise clear to Heaven, and these the words he sang:

'Almighty Lord Most High, to Thee belong
Glory and honour, and to none beside;
No soul there is worthy to name Thy Name.

'I praise Thee for Thy creatures, oh my God,
And specially for him who gives us Day,
The Sun, my brother; radiant is his face,
And in his light we see Thy image, Lord.

'I praise Thee, Lord, because Thy hand has made
The Moon, my sister, and the countless host,
In shining mail, which fills the lucid heavens.

'I praise Thee for my brothers, Thy great Winds,
For Air and Cloud, Thy Heavens serene, and all
Thy seasons which give sustenance to men.

'I praise Thee for my sister, the bland force
Of Water, who, to serve the needs of men,
Yields without stint her chaste and precious power.

'I praise Thee for my strenuous brother Fire,
By whose brave aid Thou dost illume the night;
Jocund and fair is he, unquenched and strong.

'I praise Thee for our bounteous mother Earth,
Who keeps and nourishes our race, and gives
A thousand kindly iruits to cheer our lives,
Sweet flowers of varied hues, and every herb.

'I praise Thee for the souls which, for Thy love,
Forgiving evil, sorrow bear and pain;
Blessed are they who meekly take Thy cross,
And gain, oh Thou Most High! to wear Thy crown.

'I praise Thee for our sister bodily Death,
Whom none who live and breathe shall 'scape at last.
Woe, woe to them who die in mortal sin!
But blest are they, oh Lord, who do Thy Will;
They shall not dread the great, the second Death.

'Thy Name, dear Lord, let all men praise and bless,
And serve Thee still in utter humbleness!'

Thus in an ecstasy of faith he lived,
Begging his bread long time; for all his wealth
He gave to build the churches which he loved,
And in his narrow cell below the hill
On which Assisi towers, hard by the shrine,
Our Lady of the Angels, happy years
He dwelt and pondered, till at length he knew
His mission to the world, to preach, to call
All people to new life, speaking the words
God gave him, not his own. And everywhere
There came a blessing on his work, and men
And pious women listened, and his words
Burned like a fire within their hearts. And last
At Rome, the Pontiff, wondering at a dream,
Wherein the pilgrim, of his strength, upheld
The tottering Church, confirmed his saintly Rule;
And he, with joyful heart returning, sought
His lowly cell, and gathered round him all
His Brethren of the Faith, and there he spent
Long happy years of blessed Poverty.

Likewise, because for faithful souls the lot
Of God's dumb creatures presses with a weight
Of wonder whence they come, and for what end,
These humble helpers of our race, to whom
Their master is as God, or how the doom
Of nothingness awaits at last their good
And honourable service; and because,
Loving his Lord, he loved all creatures too
His hand had fashioned; worm and creeping thing
Upon his path he crushed not, but would set
In safety; and the joyous songs of birds,
The soaring lark, the passionate nightingale,
He knew for hymns of praise, and oft would join
His jubilant voice with theirs. Around his feet,
As in the fields he walked, the innocent lambs
Would gambol, and the timid fur-clad things
Nestled within his bosom, fearing not
His gentle hand. But most of all the birds
He loved, the swift-winged messengers who pass
'Twixt earth and Heaven, and seem as if they bear
A double nature, close in brotherhood
With all he loved; and when he heard their song,
Pierced through with joy and utter thankfulness,
He with alternate praise would join with them,
And once, with soaring antiphons at eve,
Vied with a nightingale, till the brief night
Was well-nigh spent, and he could sing no more,
Since his voice failed him. And he bade the blithe
Cicale chirping in the acacia thus,
'Sing, sisters; praise the Lord;' and hearing him,
They shrilled their answering song, and he was glad.

And one, the foremost of his band, there was,
The Lady Clara, then and now a saint.
She with the Master lived in grave discourse
And holy converse, and one day it seemed,
When at their frugal meal upon the grass
She, with her sisters, sate around the saint,
He with such sweet discourse declared the Faith,
That they forgot their food and paused to take
The spiritual feast, with eyes and hearts
Raised up to Heaven; and all the folk around
Marked how the convent and the low church gleamed
With light which shone like fire, and, hasting there,
Found the saints wrapt in silent musing thought,
Forgetful of their meal, and knew the light
Was but the fire divine of Faith, which burned
Within those saintly hearts, and to their homes
Turned wondering.
But while he lived serene,
Dissolved in happy tears, his soul desired
The martyr's blessed palm, and fain would go
Forth to the Paynim host, which then bore rule
O'er all the sacred fields of Palestine;
But a storm drove him back. Then to the Moor
He yearned to preach; but grievous sickness came,
And stayed his feet. Last, by the fabled Nile,
He gave his body to burn if they would take
The Faith of Christ; but when the Moslem heard,
Deeming such sacrifice too great for man,
He sent him home with honour. Not for him
The martyr's palm, but to build up the Church
By years of labour crowned with saintly death.

Thus ten years passed, and then upon the plain
Around his cell the Brethren of his Rule
In thousands flocked from every Christian land,
And by his triple Vow of Poverty,
Obedience, Chastity, bound fast their lives,
As the saint bade them, and to every clime
Went forth his envoys. He it was who first,
A rapt ascetic, with foreseeing mind,
Brought to the service of the Faith the lives
Whose path lay through the world, and the fresh zeal
Of Woman, from the peasant to the Queen.
Long from his place he governed far and wide
His nascent Order, till at last, his soul
Grown sick for Heaven and heavenly thoughts, he passed,
Far from his brethren and the praise of men,
To some lone cell on the preciptious side
Of blue Alverno, high above the vale,
Above the winding river, above the heights
Of white Assisi, where his failing sight
Might rest upon the everlasting hills.
There, in rapt contemplation and fair dreams,
He spent his soul.
There, year by rapturous year,
The heavens stood open to his gaze; the face
Of the Madonna, with the Child Divine,
Beamed on him. There the blessed Presence filled
His yearning eyes. There, in an ecstasy
'Twas said, the failing body, strong in love,
Like the pure soul cleansed from her earthy stains,
Took his dear Master's wounds, and bore again
The Passion; and the inmost Heaven, unsealed,
Opening disclosed the Angelic Host and all
The glories else unseen by mortal eye,
Till, in seraphic ardour, the saint's soul,
Throbbing with bliss well-nigh too great for earth,
Wore thin the walls of life, and sickness came,
And weakness, and his eyes grew dim with tears --
Tears not of sorrow all, but mixt with joy
For those his happy visions; tears of pain
For the world's sin; tears of a faithful hope
For Heaven and all the blessedness to be.

There, when he knew his end draw nigh, he hailed
The coming freedom; and, because his soul
Was humble, ordered that his dust should rest
Where, mouldering in unconsecrated ground,
The malefactors lay. Then, with weak voice,
Bidding them set him on the sweet bare earth
Beneath the evening sky, he murmured low
The Imploring Psalm, 'To Thee, Lord, have I cried;
Thou art my hope;' and struggling to the close,
'Bring my soul out of prison,' straightway breathed
His last pure breath.
Then those who loved him bare
His body to the tomb. And when they passed
By San Damiano, all the sorrowing nuns,
S. Clara and her sisters, weeping, knelt
And kissed his hands; and that dishonoured grave,
Since there a saint slept in the peace of Heaven,
Grew honoured for all time and consecrate.

And over him they built a stately church,
Wherein, beneath a costly pillared shrine
Of jasper and of sardonyx, he waits,
Who was so poor in life, the Judgment Day,
And named it by his name; and there, hard by,
They reared a stately convent of his Rule;
And church and convent, of the loving skill
Of painters whom the Faith's reviving fire
Kindled to Art, glow with celestial hues
Of beauty. There the archaic simple hand
Of Cimabue wrought. There Giotto dreamt
His saintly stories, only part of earth,
While the stern Bard of Heaven and Hell stood near
With counsel, honouring the name he deemed
'A sunrise on the world.' There, quaintly true,
Orcagna, Cavallini, Gozzoli,
Light the rich walls. There blooms the stainless thought
Of the Angelic Brother, and the pure
Rapture of Perugino, and the soul
He reared, the wonder and despair of Art.
Raffaelle, and a throng of names inspired
Who sought not fame of men. And compassed round
By those high glories lies the sacred dust
Of him who, wedding saintly Poverty,
Lived there long time despised, though now he soars
Higher than earthly thrones, a Saint in Heaven."





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