[[A-text]]
to the happy memory of five Francisan nuns, exiles by the Falck Laws,
drowned between midnight |&| morning of December 7 [[1875]].

PART THE FIRST



 Thou mastering me
 God! giver of breath and bread;
 World's strand, sway of the sea;
 Lord of living |&| dead;
 Thou hast bound bones |&| veins in me, fastened me flesh,
 And after it {'a}lmost {'u}nmade, what with dread,
 Thy doing: |&| dost thou touch me afresh?
 Over again I feel thy finger |&| find the{'e}.



 I did say yes
 O at lightning |&| lashed rod;
 Thou heardst me truer than tongue confess
 Thy terror, O Christ, O God;
 Thou knowest the walls, altar |&| hour |&| night:
 The swoon of a heart that the sweep |&| the hurl of thee trod
 Hard down with a horror of height:
 And the midriff astrain with leaning of, laced with fire of stress.



 The frown of his face
 Before me, the hurtle of hell
 Behind, where, where was a, where was a place?
 I whirled out wings that spell
 And fled with a fling of the heart to the heart of the Host.
 My heart, but you were dovewinged, I can tell,
 Carrier-witted, I am bold to boast,
 To flash from the flame to the flame then, tower from the grace to the
grace



 I am soft sift
 In an hourglass -- at the wall
 Fast, but mined with a motion, a drift,
 And it crowds |&| it combs to the fall;
 I steady as a water in a well, to a poise, to a pane,
 But roped with, always, all the way down from the tall
 Fells or flanks of the voel, a vein
 Of the gospel proffer, a pressure, a principle, Christ's gift.



 I kiss my hand
 To the stars, lovely-asunder
 Starlight, wafting him out of it; and
 Glow, glory in thunder;
 Kiss my hand to the dappled-with-damson west:
 Since, tho'he is under the world's splendour |&| wonder,
 His mystery must be instressed, stressed;
 For I greet him the days I meet him, |&| bless when I understand.



 Not out of his bliss
 Springs the stress felt
 Nor first from heaven (and few know this)
 Swings the stroke dealt --
 Stroke |&| a stress that stars |&| storms deliver,
 That guilt is hushed by, hearts are flushed by |&| melt --
 But it rides time like riding a river
 (And here the faithful waver, the faithless fable |&| miss).



 It dates from day
 Of his going in Galilee;
 Warm-laid grave of a womb-life grey;
 Manger, maiden's knee;
 The dense |&| the driven Passion, |&| frightful sweat:
 Thence the discharge of it, there its swelling to be,
 Tho'felt before, though in high flood yet --
 What none would have known of it, only the heart, being hard at bay,



 Is out with it! Oh,
 We lash with the best or worst
 Word last! How a lush-kept plush-capped sloe
 Will, mouthed to flesh-burst,
 Gush! -- flush the man, the being with it, sour or sweet,
 Brim, in a flash, full! -- Hither then, last or first,
 To hero of Calvary, Christ,'s feet --
 Never ask if meaning it, wanting it, warned of it -- men go.



 Be adored among men,
 God, three-number{'e}d form;
 Wring thy rebel, dogged in den,
 Man's malice, with wrecking |&| storm.
 Beyond saying sweet, past telling of tongue,
 Thou art lightning |&| love, I found it, a winter |&| warm;
 Father |&| fondler of heart thou hast wrung:
 Hast thy dark descending |&| most art merciful then.



 With an anvil-ding
 And with fire in him forge thy will
 Or rather, rather then, stealing as Spring
 Through him, melt him but master him still:
 Whether {'a}t {'o}nce, as once at a crash Paul,
 Or as Austin, a lingering-out sweet skill,
 Make mercy in all of us, out of us all
 Mastery, but be adored, but be adored king.

Part the second

---------------------------------------------------------------------------



 "Some find me a sword; some
 The flange |&| the rail; flame,
 Fang, or flood" goes Death on drum,
 And storms bugle his fame.
 But w{'e} dr{'e}am we are rooted in earth -- Dust!
 Flesh falls within sight of us, we, though our flower the same,
 Wave with the meadow, forget that there must
 The sour scythe cringe, |&| the blear share come.



 On Saturday sailed from Bremen,
 American-outward-bound,
 Take settler |&| seamen, tell men with women,
 Two hundred souls in the round --
 O Father, not under thy feathers nor ever as guessing
 The goal was a shoal, of a fourth the doom to be drowned;
 Yet d{'i}d the dark side of the bay of thy blessing
 Not vault them, the million of rounds of thy mercy not reeve even them
in?



 Into the snows she sweeps,
 Hurling the haven behind,
 The Deutschland, on Sunday; |&| so the sky keeps,
 For the infinite air is unkind,
 And the sea flint-flake, black-backed in the reg