DO YE BELIEVE? We never wrote For fools at ease to know The doubt that grips us by the throat, The faith that lurks below; But we have stood beside our dead, And, in that hour of need, One tear the Man of Sorrows shed Was more than any creed. Do ye believe? -- from age to age The little thinkers cry; And rhymesters ape the puling sage In pride of artistry. Did Joshua stay a sun that rolls Around a central earth? -- Our modern men have modern souls And formulate their mirth. But, while they laugh, from shore to shore, From sea to moaning sea, Eloi, Eloi, goes up once more Lama sabacthani! The heavens are like a scroll unfurled, The writing flames above -- This is the King of all the world Upon His Cross of Love! His members marred with wounds are we In whom the spirit strives, One Body of one Mystery, One Life in many lives: Darkly as in a glass we see The mystic glories glow, Nor shrink from God's Infinity Incarnate here below! In flower, and dust, in chaff and grain, He binds Himself and dies, We live by His eternal pain, His hourly sacrifice; The limits of our mortal life Are His: the whisper thrills Under the sea's perpetual strife And through the sunburnt hills. Seek; ye shall find each flower on earth A gateway to My heart, Whose Life has brought each leaf to birth; The whole is in the part! So to My sufferers have ye given What help or hope may be, Oh then, through earth, through hell, through heaven, Ye did it unto Me! Darkly, as in a glass, our sight Still gropes through Time and Space: We cannot see the Light of Light With angels, face to face; Only the tale His martyrs tell Around the dark earth rings -- He died and He went down to hell And lives -- the King of Kings! Do ye believe? On every side Great hints of Him go by: Souls that are hourly crucified On some new Calvary! Oh, tortured faces, white and meek, Half seen amidst the crowd, Grey suffering lips that never speak, The Glory in the Cloud! Do ye believe? The straws that dance Far down the dusty road Mean little to the careless glance By careless eyes bestowed, Till full into your face the wind Smites, and the laugh is dumb; And, from the rending heavens behind, Christ answers -- Lo, I come. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...LINES WRITTEN AT THE GRAVE OF ALEXANDER DUMAS by GWENDOLYN B. BENNETT IN A GONDOLA by ROBERT BROWNING MOTLEY by WALTER JOHN DE LA MARE ON GROWING OLD by JOHN MASEFIELD A HOLIDAY by LIZETTE WOODWORTH REESE BARBARA FRIETCHIE [SEPTEMBER 13, 1862] by JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER |