Fallen Stars

God's Grandeur

THE WORLD is charged with the grandeur of God.  
  It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;  
  It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil  
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?  
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;            5
  And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;  
  And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil  
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.  

And for all this, nature is never spent;  
  There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;            10
And though the last lights off the black West went  
  Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs—  
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent  
  World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

 

Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844–89)

Peace

 

 "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."  Philippians 4:6-8 (NIV)

Rain

"Into each life some rain must fall, Some days must be dark and dreary."  

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The Ballad of Trees and the Master

A Ballad of Trees and the Master
by Sidney Lanier

INTO the woods my Master went,
Clean forspent, forspent.
Into the woods my Master came,
Forspent with love and shame.
But the olives they were not blind to Him; 

The little gray leaves were kind to Him
The thorn-tree had a mind to Him
When into the woods He came.

Out of the woods my Master went,
And He was well content. Out of the woods my Master came,
Content with death and shame.
When Death and Shame would woo Him last,
From under the trees they drew Him last:
’T was on a tree they slew Him—last, When out of the woods He came.

by Sidney Lanier

Light Traveler

"Whenever a snowflake leaves the sky,
It turns and turns to say “Good-by!
Good-by, dear clouds, so cool and gray!”
Then lightly travels on its way."  Mary Mapes Dodge

Morning Has Broken

Mine is the sunlight, mine is the morning
Born of the One Light Eden saw play
Praise with elation, praise for the morning
God's recreation of the new day--Eleanor Farjeon

"Prayer is the soul s sincere desire, Uttered or unexpressed,— The motion of a hidden fire That trembles in the breast." James Montgomery