THIS IS HE
By a Student
Judgment is mastered,
Fear of death destroyed.
Nor sees God earthward walking,
Man in form, grey bearded,
Peering secret fastnesses,
With wrath forth-going
In the vibrant storm.
This is no God ye builded,
Who believed and dreamed Him vengeful;
Such God, perchance,
The priests of Baal worshiped, lifting high
Altars of lust and templed ignorance.
God is not made with hands!
How long, how long
Must He ...who transcends temples
Vainly wait, knocking at doors
Unclean with web of dust,
...The warder sunk in sleep beyond the gate?
This rather,
God who tarries in the grove
And wakes the liquid echoes ...but now mute;
Tuning the breast which lifts a ruffled throat,
Sounding its mellow pipe or wistful flute.
And this is He
Who tips the upland rim
With mystery of color; this is God
Who wakes the seed and thrusts its tender roots
With force unmeasured
From the heaving sod.
And this,
Who stirs some unformed peasant boy
To dreams of Christhood;
Shapes the dulcet note of destined songstress;
She so little taught ...awakes,
God's finger ...thrilling lip and throat.
And this is God who moves the beauteous bronze
Of Swamis by the Ganges,
Pointing west where sinks the sun
Beyond far seas.
And this, who calls the dreamer
From his dream of bliss.
Who calls the dreamer,
"Wake, my soul, awake!"
He enters in
And going forth once more
Thou seemest
God in boundless space,
For He hath left ajar
The once closed door.
God, whom I know with inner knowledge, come!
Light, seen with inner single eye, abide!
Thy boundless Oms are rolling,
Drum on drum;
How dulled the ectasies of earth beside!
Come! Thou comest! Come!
Await, my soul;
Still ...earthly silence, doubly still, and hear
The far reverb'rant song of planets roll,
Earth upon Earth
And cycling sphere on sphere!