St.
Michael's Star
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IN the
pure solitude of dusk
One star is set to shine
Above the sundown’s dying rose,
A lamp before a shrine.
It is the star of Michael lit
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In the
minster of the sun,
That every toiling hand may give
Thanks for the day’s work done.
For when the almighty word went forth
To bid creation be,—
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The
glimmering star-tracks on the blue,
The tide-belts on the sea,—
Perfect as planned, from Michael’s hand
The lasting hills arose,
Their bases on the poppied plain,
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| Their
peaks in bannered snows.
Cedar and thorn and oak were born;
Green fiddleheads uncurled
In the spring woods; gold adder-tongues
Came forth to glad the world;—
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The
magic of the punctual seeds,
Each with its pregnant powers,
As the lord Michael fashioned them
To keep their days and hours.
Frail fins to ride the monstrous tide,
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Soft
wings to poise and gleam,
He formed the pageant tribe by tribe
As vivid as a dream.
And still must his beneficence
Renew, create, sustain,
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Sorcery
of the wind and sun,
Alchemy of the rain.
Teeming with God, the kindly sod
Yearns through the summer days
With the mute eloquence of flowers,
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Its
only means of praise.
At dusk and dawn the tranquil hills
Throb to the song of birds,
And all the dim blue silence thrills
To transport not of words.
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For earth must breed to spirit’s need,
Clay to the finer clay,
That soul through sense find recompense
And rapture on her way.
And man, from dust and dreaming wrought,
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To all
things must impart
The trend and likeness of his thought,
The passion of his heart.
The love and lore he shall acquire
To word and deed must dare;
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Resemblances
of God his sire
His voice and mien must bear.
His children’s children shall portray
The skill which he bestows
On living; and what life must mean
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| His
craftsman’s instinct knows.
Line upon line and tone by tone,
The visioned form he gives
To sound and color, wood and stone,
Takes loveliness and lives.
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He sees
his project’s soaring hope
Grow substance, and expand
To measure a diviner scope
Beneath his patient hand.
To pencil, brush, and burnisher
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His
wizardry he lends,
And to the care of lathe and loom
His secret he commends.
In hues and forms and cadences
New beauty he instills,
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A brother
by the right of craft
To Michael of the hills.
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