I. O GREAT and wise, clear-souled and high of heart, One the last flower of Catholic love, that grows Amid bare thorns their only thornless rose, From the fierce juggling of the priests' loud mart Yet alien, yet unspotted and apart From the blind hard foul rout whose shameless shows Mock the sweet heaven whose secret no man knows With prayers and curses and the soothsayer's art; One like a storm-god of the northern foam Strong, wrought of rock that breasts and breaks the sea And thunders back its thunder, rhyme for rhyme Answering, as though to outroar the tides of time And bid the world's wave back -- what song should be Theirs that with praise would bring and sing you home? II. With all our hearts we praise you whom ye hate, High souls that hate us; for our hopes are higher, And higher than yours the goal of our desire, Though high your ends be as your hearts are great. Your world of Gods and kings, of shrine and state, Was of the night when hope and fear stood nigher, Wherein men walked by light of stars and fire Till man by day stood equal with his fate. Honor not hate we give you, love not fear, Last prophets of past kind, who fill the dome Of great dead Gods with wrath and wail, nor hear Time's word and man's: 'Go honored hence, go home, Night's childless children; here your hour is done; Pass with the stars, and leave us with the sun.' | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...IN THE BERKSHIRE HILLS by LOUIS UNTERMEYER THE BLACK COTTAGE by ROBERT FROST EPIGRAM: EHEU FUGACES by RICHARD HARRIS BARHAM PRAYERS by HENRY CHARLES BEECHING WHEN ON THE MARGE OF EVENING by LOUISE IMOGEN GUINEY THE LONELY STREET by WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS |