WHEN blessed Marie wip'd her Saviours feet, (Whose precepts she had trampled on before,) And wore them for a jewell on her head, Shewing his steps should be the street Wherein she thenceforth evermore With pensive humblenesse would live and tread: She being stain'd herself, why did she strive To make Him clean who could not be defil'd? Why kept she not her tears for her own faults, And not his feet? Though we could dive In tears like seas, our sinnes are pil'd Deeper then they in words, and works, and thoughts. Deare soul, she knew who did vouchsafe and deigne To bear her filth, and that her sinnes did dash Ev'n God himself: wherefore she was not loth, As she had brought wherewith to stain, So to bring in wherewith to wash; And yet, in washing one, she washed both. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...GOAL by GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON MEMORY by GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON CORPORATE ENTITY by ARCHIBALD MACLEISH DOMESDAY BOOK: FATHER WHIMSETT by EDGAR LEE MASTERS THE NEGRO'S TRAGEDY by CLAUDE MCKAY HOMAGE TO SEXTUS PROPERTIUS: 9 by EZRA POUND |