SIBYLLINE
by: Madison Julius Cawein
(1865-1914)
- HERE is a glory in the apple boughs
- Of silver moonlight; like a torch of myrrh,
- Burning upon an altar of sweet vows,
- Dropped from the hand of some wan worshipper:
- And there is life among the apple blooms
- Of whispring winds; as if a god addressed
- The flamen from the sanctuary glooms
- With secrets of the bourne that hope hath guessed,
- Saying: Behold! a darkness which illumes,
- A waking which is rest.
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- There is a blackness in the apple trees
- Of tempest; like the ashes of an urn
- Hurt hands have gathered upon blistered knees,
- With salt of tears, out of the flames that burn:
- And there is death among the blooms, that fill
- The night with breathless scent,--as when, above
- The priest, the vision of his faith doth will
- Forth from his soul the beautiful form thereof,--
- Saying: Behold! a silence never still;
- The other form of love.
"Sibylline" is reprinted
from The Oxford Book of English Mystical Verse. Ed. Nicholson
& Lee. Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1917. |
MORE POEMS BY MADISON JULIUS CAWEIN |
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