O God of silence, Purifiez nos cœurs, Purifiez nos cœurs, O God of waters, make clean our hearts within us And our lips to show forth thy praise, For I have seen the Shadow of this thy Venice Floating upon the waters, And thy stars Have seen this thing out of their far courses Have they seen this thing, O God of waters, Even as are thy stars Silent unto us in their far-coursing, Even so is mine heart become silent within me. _Purifiez nos cœurs_ _O God of the silence,_ _Purifiez nos cœurs_ _O God of waters._ Sandalphon The angel of prayer according to the Talmud stands unmoved among the angels of wind and fire, who die as their one song is finished, also as he gathers the prayers they turn to flowers in his hands. And these about me die, Because the pain of the infinite singing Slayeth them. Ye that have sung of the pain of the earth-horde's age-long crusading, Ye know somewhat the strain, the sad-sweet wonder-pain of such singing. And therefore ye know after what fashion This singing hath power destroying. Yea, these about me, bearing such song in homage Unto the Mover of Circles, Die for the might of their praising, And the autumn of their marcescent wings Maketh ever new loam for my forest; And these grey ash trees hold within them All the secrets of whatso things They dreamed before their praises, And in this grove my flowers, Fruit of prayerful powers, Have first their thought of life And then their being. Ye marvel that I die not! _forsitan_! Thinking me kin with such as may not weep, Thinking me part of them that die for praising --yea, tho' it be praising, past the power of man's mortality to dream or name its phases, --yea, tho' it chant and paean past the might of earth-dwelt soul to think on, --yea, tho' it be praising as these the winged ones die of. Ye think me one insensate else die I also Sith these about me die, And if I, watching Ever the multiplex jewel, of beryl and jasper and sapphire Make of these prayers of earth ever new flowers; Marvel and wonder! Marvel and wonder even as I, Giving to prayer new language And causing the works to speak Of the earth-horde's age-lasting longing, Even as I marvel and wonder, and know not, Yet keep my watch in the ash wood. Sestina: Altaforte LOQUITUR: _En_ Bertrans de Born. Dante Alighieri put this man in hell for that he was a stirrer-up of strife. Eccovi! Judge ye! Have I dug him up again? The scene is at his castle, Altaforte. "Papiols" is his jongleur. "The Leopard," the _device_ of Richard (Cœur de Lion). I