Before me lies the desert and the night, White star and gold above a pathless waste, Blue shade and gray to where the world effaced Flings loose its shadows on the lap of God. Briars and dust upon my brow, unshod, In pilgrim weeds athwart a vineless land, My feet shall pass and mark the path aright, For lo! Thy staff and rod are in my hand; And with the light Thy city shall unfurl Its golden oriflames and tents of pearl-- Dead Babylon, thy gilden clasp I flee; Jerusalem, lift up thy gates to me! ON THE FEAST OF THE ASSUMPTION BY ELEANOR DOWNING “Mary, uplifted to our sight In cloudy vesture stainless-white, Why are thine eyes like stars alight, Twin flames of charity?” “Mine eyes are on His glorious face That shone not on earth’s darkened place, But clothed and crowned me with grace-- The God who fathered me!” “Mary, against the sinless glow Of angel pinions white as snow, Why are thy fair lips parted so In ecstasy of love?” “My lips are parted to His breath Who breathed on me in Nazareth And gave me life to live in death-- My Spouse, the spotless Dove!” “Mary, whose eager feet would spurn The very clouds, whose pale hands yearn Toward rifted Heaven that fires burn Where once was fixed the sword?” “The fires I felt when His child head Lay on this mother’s heart that bled, And when it lay there stark and dead-- My little Child, my Lord!” MARY BY ELEANOR DOWNING A garden like a chalice-cup, With bloom of almond white and pink, And starred hibiscus to the brink, From which sweet waters bubble up. A garden walled with ilex-trees And topped with blue, white clouds between Save where the glossed leaves’ twinkling green Is stirred by some soft-footed breeze A place apart, a watered glade, Where sin and sorrow have not been, And earth’s complaint grows hushed within Its greening aisles of sacred shade. The circling arms, the flower face, Such were they to the Child soft-pressed, Who drew all sweetness from the breast Of her whom angels crowned with grace. A night of storm and wailing stress, A coast that cradles to the shock Of waves that lap the pitted rock, And winds that shriek their wrathfulness; A night of all wild things unpent, Strange voices and strange shapes that beat To chill the heart and snare the feet. And through the tempest, beacon-bent To shelter from the driving damp Bespeaking warmth and sweet repose Within its sanctuary close, The welcome of a red shrine-lamp. So unto Him Who, weary, pressed Through the fierce storm of wrath and hate, Shone Mary’s love, a chapel-gate Where He might enter Him and rest.