This is not a collection of devotional poems. It is not an attempt to rival Orby Shipley’s admirable “Carmina Mariana” or any other similar anthology. What I have tried to do is to bring together the poems in English that I like best that were written by Catholics since the middle of the Nineteenth Century. There are in this book poems religious in theme; there are also love-songs and war songs. But I think that it may be called a book of Catholic poems. For a Catholic is not a Catholic only when he prays; he is a Catholic in all the thoughts and actions of his life. And when a Catholic attempts to reflect in words some of the Beauty of which as a poet he is conscious, he cannot be far from prayer and adoration.

The Church has never been without her great poets. And in the Nineteenth Century there was a splendid renascence of Catholic poetry written in English. It had already begun when Francis Thompson wrote his Essay on Shelley, in which he longed for the by-gone days when poetry was “the lesser sister and helpmate of the Church; the minister to the mind, as the Church to the soul.” The members of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood were not Catholics, but their movement was related to the renascence of Catholic poetry—it was an attempt to restore to art and letters some of the glory of the days before what is called the Reformation. Coventry Patmore carried the theories of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood to their logical conclusion, as Newman did those of the Tractarians. Coventry Patmore became a Catholic, and found in his Faith his inspiration and his theme. And his disciple Francis Thompson, born to the Faith which Patmore reached by way of the divine adventure of conversion, with art even greater than that of his master, made of the language of Protestant England an instrument of Catholic adoration.

A few of the poets represented in this book were not yet Catholics when they wrote the poems I have quoted. But I do not think that anyone will find fault with me for including Newman and Hawker among the Catholic poets. I am very sorry that the limitations of space have made me exclude many poems dear to me, many poems that are part of the world’s literary heritage. There should be many Catholic anthologies.

The poet sees things hidden from other men, but he sees them only in dreams. A poet is (by the very origin of the word) a maker, but a maker of images, not a creator of life. This is a book of reflections of the Beauty which mortal eyes can see only in reflection, a book of dreams of that Truth which one day we shall waking understand. A book of images it is, too, containing representations carved by those who worked by the aid of memory, the strange memory of men living in Faith.

Joyce Kilmer.

August, 1917.

165th Regiment, Camp Mills, Mineola, New York.

CONTENTS

PAGE
Belloc, Hilaire
[Our Lord and Lady]1
[To the Balliol Men Still in Africa]2
[The South Country]3
[The Early Morning]6
[The Prophet Lost in the Hills at Evening]6
[The Birds]7
[Courtesy]8
[Noel]9
Benson, Robert Hugh
[After a Retreat]10
[The Teresian Contemplation]11
Blunt, Wilfred Scawen
[How Shall I Build]12
[Song]13
[The Desolate City]13
Brayton, Teresa
[A Christmas Song]16
Campbell, Nancy
[Like One I Know]18
Carbery, Ethna
[Mea Culpa]19
[In Tir-na’n-Og]20
Carroll, P. J.
[Lady Day in Ireland]22
[St. Patrick’s Treasure]23
Casey, D. A.
[The Spouse of Christ]24
Colum, Padraic
[Christ the Comrade]25
[An Old Woman of the Roads]25
Conway, Katherine Eleanor
[The Heaviest Cross of All]26
[Saturninus]28
Cox, Eleanor Rogers
[Dreaming of Cities Dead]29
[Death of Cuchulain]30
[Gods and Heroes of the Gael]32
[At Benediction]34
Custance, Olive
[Primrose Hill]34
[Twilight]35
Daly, Thomas A.
[To a Thrush]36
[To a Plain Sweetheart]40
[To a Robin]40
[The Poet]41
[October]42
De Vere, Aubrey
[Sorrow]43
[Human Life]44
[Cardinal Manning]45
[Song]45
Dollard, James B.
[The Sons of Patrick]46
[Song of the Little Villages]48
[The Soul of Karnaghan Buidhe]49
Donahue, D. J.
[The Angelic Chorus]51
Donnelly, Eleanor
[Ladye Chapel at Eden Hall]52
[Mary Immaculate]52
Downing, Eleanor
[The Pilgrim]53
[On the Feast of the Assumption]54
[Mary]55
Dowson, Ernest
[Extreme Unction]58
[Benedictio Domini]58
[Carthusians]58
Drane, Augusta T.
[Maris Stella]60
Earls, S.J., Michael
[An Autumn Rose Tree]62
[To a Carmelite Postulant]63
Eden, Helen Parry
[A Purpose of Amendment]64
[The Confessional]65
[An Elegy]66
[Sorrow]70
Edmund, C.P., Father
[Our Lady’s Death]71
Egan, Maurice Francis
[Vigil of the Immaculate Conception]71
[The Old Violin]72
[Maurice de Guerin]73
[He Made Us Free]73
Faber, Father
[Grandeur of Mary]75
[Right Must Win]77
Fitzpatrick, John
[Mater Dolorosa]79
Furlong, Alice
[Yuletide]79
Gaffney, O.P., Francis A.
[Our Lady of the Rosary]81
Garesché, S.J., Edward F.
[At the Leap of the Waters]81
[Niagara]83
Giltinan, Caroline
[Communion]85
Griffin, Gerald
[The Nightingale]86
Guiney, Louise Imogen
[Tryste Noel]86
[The Wild Ride]87
[Ode for a Master Mariner Ashore]89
[In Leinster]91
Hawker, Robert Stephen
[Aunt Mary]92
[King Arthur’s Wassail]93
Hayes, James M.
[Old Nuns]94
[The Mother of the Rose]95
[Transfiguration]96
Hickey, Emily M.
[Beloved, It Is Morn]97
[A Sea Story]98
Hopkins, S.J., Gerard
[The Starlight Night]99
[The Habit of Perfection]100
[Spring]101
Iris, Scharmel
[The Friar of Genoa]102
Johnson, Lionel
[The Dark Angel]103
[Te Martyrum Candidatus]105
[Christmas and Ireland]106
[To My Patrons]108
[Our Lady of the Snows]109
[Cadgwith]111
[A Friend]112
[The Statue of King Charles at Charing Cross]113
Kelly, Blanche Mary
[The Housewife’s Prayer]115
[Brother Juniper]116
Kelley, Mgr., F. C.
[The Throne of the King]117
Lathrop, George Parsons
[The Child’s Wish Granted]127
[Charity]128
Lathrop, Rose Hawthorne
[A Song Before Grief]128
[The Clock’s Song]129
Leamy, Sir Edmund
[Ireland]130
Leamy, Edmund (Senior)
[Music Magic]132
[Gethsemane]133
[My Lips Would Sing ⸺]134
[My Ship]135
[Visions]135
Leslie, Shane
[Ireland, Mother of Priests]137
Lindsay, Ruth Temple
[The Hunters]138
Livingston, Father
[In Cherry Land]140
M. S. M.
[Surrender]141
Mangan, James Clarence
[Pentecost]142
[Dark Rosaleen]143
MacDonagh, Thomas
[What is White?]146
[Wishes for My Son]147
MacManus, Seumas
[Resignation]148
[In Dark Hour]150
Maynard, Theodore
[A Song of Colours]151
[The World’s Miser]152
[Cecidit, Cecidit, Babylon Magna]153
[A Song of Laughter]154
[Apocalypse]155
McCarthy, Denis A.
[St. Brigid]156
[Rosa Mystica]160
[The Poor Man’s Daily Bread]161
McGee, Thomas D’Arcy
[To Ask Our Lady’s Patronage]162
Meynell, Alice
[A General Communion]163
[The Shepherdess]163
[Christ in the Universe]164
[“I Am the Way”]165
[Via, et Veritas, et Vita]166
[Unto Us a Son is Given]166
[To a Daisy]167
[The Newer Vainglory]168
Meynell, Wilfrid
[The Folded Flock]168
Moriarty, Helen L.
[Convent Echoes]169
Newman, John Henry
[England]170
[The Pillar of the Cloud]171
[The Greek Fathers]171
[Relics of Saints]172
[The Sign of the Cross]173
O’Donnell, C.S.C., Charles L.
[The Son of God]173
[To St. Joseph]174
[The Dead Musician]175
O’Hagan, Thomas
[Giotto’s Campanile]178
O’Reilly, John Boyle
[Name of Mary]179
O’Reilly, Mary A.
[A Christmas Carol]180
O. Sheel, Shaemas
[Roma Mater Sempaeterna]182
[Mary’s Baby]183
[They Went Forth to Battle]183
[He Whom A Dream Hath Possessed]184
Pallen, Condé Benoist
[Maria Immaculata]186
[The Raising of the Flag]191
[The Babe of Bethlehem]194
Patmore, Coventry
[The Toys]195
[“If I Were Dead”]197
[Departure]197
[Regina Cœli]199
Pearse, P. H.
[Ideal]199
Phillips, Charles
[Music]200
Plunkett, Joseph M.
[I See His Blood Upon the Rose]202
[The Stars Sang in God’s Garden]202
Probyn, May
[Is It Nothing to You?]203
[The Bees of Myddleton Manor]204
Proctor, Adelaide Anne
[A Legend]210
[The Sacred Heart]211
[The Annunciation]214
[Our Daily Bread]216
Randall, James Ryder
[My Maryland]217
[Magdalen]220
[Why the Robin’s Breast Was Red]221
Repplier, Agnes
[Le Repos in Egypte—The Sphinx]221
Roche, James Jeffrey
[Andromeda]222
[Nature the False Goddess]223
[Three Doves]224
[The Way of the World]225
Rooney, John Jerome
[Ave Maria]225
[Revelation]227
[Marquette on the Shores of the Mississippi]229
[The Empire Builder]230
[The Men Behind the Guns]233
Russell, S.J., Matthew
[A Thought From Cardinal Newman]234
Ryan, Abram J.
[The Conquered Banner]235
[A Child’s Wish]237
[Sword of Robert E. Lee]238
[Song of the Mystic]239
Seton, E.
[Mary, Virgin and Mother]242
Sigerson Dora
[The Wind on the Hills]242
Spalding, John Lancaster
[Believe and Take Heart]244
Stoddard, Charles Warren
[Ave Maria Bells]245
[Stigmata]246
[The Bells of San Gabriel]247
Strahan, G.S.C., Speer
[The Poor]249
[The Promised Country]250
[Holy Communion]250
Swan, Caroline D.
[Stars of Cheer]251
Tabb, John Bannister
[Christ and the Pagan]252
[Out of Bounds]253
[Father Damien]253
[Recognition]253
[“Is Thy Servant a Dog?”]254
Thompson, Francis
[Lilium Regis]254
[To the English Martyrs]255
[The Hound of Heaven]261
[The Dread of Height]267
[To My Godchild]270
Tynan, Katherine
[Michael the Archangel]272
[Planting Bulbs]274
[Sheep and Lambs]275
[The Making of Birds]276
[The Man of the House]278
Walsh, Thomas
[Cœlo et in Terra]279
[Egidio of Coimbra]281

Dreams and Images