Category: Poetry

Lead, kindly light

Sr. Dorcee, beloved5 Comments

Lead, kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom,
Lead thou me on!
The night is dark, and I am far from home,–
Lead thou me on!
Keep thou my feet; I do not ask to see
The distant scene,–one step enough for me.

I was not ever thus, nor prayed that thou
Shouldst lead me on:
I loved to choose and see my path, but now
Lead thou me on!
I loved the garish days, and, spite of fears,
Pride ruled my will: remember not past years.

So long thy power hath blessed me, sure it still
Will lead me on;
O’er moor and fen, o’er crag and torrent, till
The night is gone;
And with the morn those angel faces smile
Which I have loved long since, and lost awhile.

John Henry Newman
Here is a lovely adaptation by Audrey Assad:

Thy Mercy Free

Sr. Dorcee, beloved1 Comment

Out of the depths we cry to thee.
Lord, hear us, we implore thee.
Bend down thy gracious ear to us.
Let our prayer come before thee!
On our misdeeds in mercy look
O deign to blot them from thy book,
And let us come before thee.

Thy sov’reign grace and boundless love
Show thee, O Lord, forgiving.
Our purest thoughts and deeds but prove
Sin in our hearts is living.
None guiltless in thy sight appear.
All who approach thy throne must fear,
And humbly trust thy mercy.

Thou canst be merciful while just.
This is our hope’s foundation.
In thy redeeming grace we trust.
O grant us thy salvation.
Upheld by thee we stand secure.
Thy word is firm, thy promise sure,
And we rely upon thee.

Like those who watch for midnight’s hour
To hail the dawning morrow,
We wait for thee, we trust thy pow’r,
Unmoved by doubt or sorrow.
So let thy people hope in thee,
And they shall find thy mercy free,
And thy redemption plenteous.

Martin Luther

I am bending my knee

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I Am Bending My Knee

Originally from the Carmina Gadelica I, 3
Taken from Esther de Waal, editor, The Celtic Vision (Liguori, MO: Liguori/Triumph, 1988, 2001), p. 7.

I am bending my knee
In the eye of the Father who created me,
In the eye of the Son who purchased me,
In the eye of the Spirit who cleansed me,
In friendship and affection.
Through Thine own Anointed One, O God,
Bestow upon us fullness in our need,
Love towards God,
The affection of God,
The smile of God,
The wisdom of God,
The grace of God,
The fear of God,
And the will of God
To do on the world of the Three,
As angels and saints
Do in heaven;
Each shade and light,
Each day and night,
Each time in kindness,
Give Thou us Thy Spirit.

The “Little People”

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For the “Little People,” Before the Blessed Sacrament

Tiny round God,
weak and small, You could fit in my hand, yet
all the span of the universe cannot contain You
all the powers of the cosmos cannot resist You.
You have made Yourself like those
who are close to Your Heart.

I carry them here with me today:
the “little people
invisible to the mighty but not to the Almighty.
The world reckons them a zero:
without wealth, without power,
without name, without face,
without arms, without voice.

But You too, Lord, are a Zero,
a white, wheaten Cipher,
a Figure on whom
they have failed to reckon.

When You foes seek to multiply
You will invade their equation
and bring them to naught:
You will nullify their pride,
annihilate their power,
annul their schemes
of domination.
But those of lowly degree
You will stand beside
to magnify.

Tiny round God,
blessed are You
who gather the poor
into the ring of Your riches,
the empty
into the cup of Your fullness,
the weak
into the crown of Your might,
the sorrowing
into the circle of Your dance.
Blessed are You,
encompassing Your people
without beginning, without end,
in Your love.

~Paul Thigpen

The King shall come

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The King shall come when morning dawns,
And light triumphant breaks;
When beauty gilds the eastern hills,
And life to joy awakes.

O brighter than that glorious morn
Shall this fair morning be,
When Christ, our King, in beauty comes,
And we his face shall see.

The King shall come when morning dawns,
And earth’s dark nigh is past;
O haste the rising of that morn,
The day that aye shall past.

The King shall come when morning dawns,
And light and beauty brings:
Hail, Christ the Lord!  Thy people pray,
Come quickly, King of kings.

Advent visitation

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A beautiful Advent Sunday-poem from Luci Shaw:

Advent visitation

Even from the cabin window I sensed the wind’s
contagion begin to infect the rags of leaves.
Then the alders gilded to it, obeisant, the way

angels are said to bow, covering their faces with
their wings, not solemn, as we suppose, but
possessed of a sudden, surreptitious hilarity.

When the little satin wind arrived,
I felt it slide through the cracked-open door
(A wisp of prescience? A change in the weather?),

and after the small push of breath–You
entering with your sir of radiant surprise,
I the astonished one.

These still December mornings
I fancy I live in a clear envelope of angels
like a cellophane womb.  Or a soap bubble,

the colors drifting, curling.  Outside
everything’s tinted rose, grape, turquoise,
silver–the stones by the path, the skin of sun

on the pond ice, at night the aureola of
a pregnant moon, like me, irridescent,
almost full-term with light.

This outcast King

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POEM FOR CHRIST THE KING

Pamela Cranston

See how this homeless babe lifted
himself down into his humble Crèche
and laid his tender glove
of skin against that splintered wood –
found refuge in that rack
of raspy straw – home
on that chilly dawn, in sweetest
silage, those shriven stalks.

See how this outcast King lifted
himself high upon his savage Cross,
extended the regal banner
of his bones, draping himself
upon his throne – his battered feet,
his wounded hands not fastened
there by nails but sewn
by the strictest thorn of Love.

© Pamela Cranston, “Poem For Christ the King”, The Anglican, Vol. 34, No. 4, October 2005.