This Flower Room of mine
Has come to be a shrine;
And I go hence
Each day with larger faith and reverence.
MY FAITH
My faith is rooted in no written creed;
And there are those who call me heretic;
Yet year on year, though I be well or sick
Or opulent, or in the slough of need,
If, light of foot, fair Life trips by me pleasuring,
Or, by the rule of pain, old Time stands measuring
The dull, drab moments—still ascends my cry:
‘God reigns on high!
He doeth all things well!’
Not much I prize, or one, or any brand
Of theologic lore; nor think too well
Of generally accepted heaven and hell.
But faith and knowledge build at Love’s command
A beauteous heaven; a heaven of thought all clarified
Of hate and fear and doubt; a heaven of rarefied
And perfect trust; and from the heaven I cry:
‘God reigns on high!
Whatever is, is best.’
My faith refuses to accept the ‘fall’!
It sees man ever as a child of God,
Growing in wisdom as new realms are trod,
Until the Christ in him is One with All.
From this full consciousness my faith is borrowing
Light to illuminate Life’s darkest sorrowing,
Whatever woes assail me still I cry:
‘God reigns on high!
He doeth all things well.’
My faith finds prayer the language of the heart,
Which gives us converse with the host unseen;
And those who linger in the vales between
The Here and Yonder, in these prayers take part.
My dead come near, and say: ‘Death means not perishing;
Cherish us in your thoughts, for by that cherishing
Shall severed links be welded by and by.’
‘God reigns on high!
Whatever is, is best.’
ARROW AND BOW
It is easy to stand in the pulpit, or in the closet to kneel,
And say: ‘God do this; God do that!—
Make the world better; relieve the sorrows of man; for the sake of Thy Son,
Oh, forgive all sin!’ Then, having planned out God’s work, to feel
Our duty is done.
It is easy to be religious this way—
Easy to pray.
It is harder to stand on the highway, or walk in the crowded mart;
And say: ‘I am He. I am He.
‘Mine the world-burden; mine the sorrows of men; mine the Christ-work
‘To forgive my brother’s sin,’ and then to live the Christ-part and never to shirk.
It is hard for you and me
To be religious this way,
Day after day.
But God is no longer in heaven; we drove Him out with our prayers,
Drove Him out with our sermons and creeds, and our endless plaints and despairs.
He came down over the borders, and Christ, too, came along;
They are looking the whole world over to see just what is wrong.
God has grown weary of hearing His praises sung on earth;
And Jesus is weary of hearing the story about His birth;
And the way to win Their favour, that is surer than any other,
Is to join in a song of Brotherhood and praises of one another.