In the Free Ward

WHEN I was a wee child
A-singing in the sun,
Came the knell, like a leper’s bell,
Of the Fateful One.

In his mouth was hunger,
In his hand was want,
There I shook beneath his look,
Bled beneath his vaunt:

‘I am lord of bodies,
I am lord of souls,
I am lord of half the horde
That die between the poles.

’I laugh at all the teachers
That have not taught of me.
I make the rules for all their schools —
My name is Poverty.

‘I laugh at all the nations
That have no thought of me:
For still their laws of me are cause —
My name is Poverty.’

When I was a wee child
A-singing in the sun,
Came a knell, like a leper’s bell:
’T was the Fateful One.

My little soul I never saw,
Nor can I count its days;
I do not know its wondrous law
And yet I know its ways.

O it is young as morning-hours —
And old as is the night;
O it has growth of budding flowers —
Yet tastes my body’s blight.

And it is silent and apart,
And far and fair and still,
Yet ever beats within my heart,
And cries within my will.

And it is light and bright and strange,
And sees life far away;
Yet far with near can interchange
And dwell within the day.

My soul has died a thousand deaths,
And yet it does not die,
My soul has broke a thousand faiths,
And yet it cannot lie;

My soul — there’s naught can make it less;
My soul — there’s naught can mar;
Yet here it weeps with loneliness
Within its lonely star.

My soul — not any dark can bind,
Nor hinder any hand,
Yet here it weeps — long blind, long blind —
And cannot understand.

How long I’ve lain below the Christ
That hangs upon the wall,
His suffering o’er my suffering:
Was his indeed for all?

Ah me, the weary, weary hours
So slowly by us file,
And not yet has the sad Christ learned —
As I have learned — to smile.

Four gray walls, four gray walls,
One green window-space;
Four gray walls — high up on one
The crucifix has place.

Four gray walls, four gray walls,
Ere the eye can trace,
Past the high-hung crucifix,
The window’s green leaf-lace.

Four gray walls, four gray walls —
O the four-square grayness palls
Of my prison-space!
Dying Christ be thankèd for
One green window’s grace.

Little Sister Rose-Marie,
Chosen bride to Christ she’ll be.
Child — she says she sees her path,
Mild — has felt God-Father’s wrath,
Vows her life forth joyfully
(Visioned unreality).

Hearken, Sister Rose-Marie:
Chosen bride to pain I be;
But I never saw his face,
And I never chose my place,
Nor the vow that wedded me
(O unseen reality).