THE SEVENFOLD SACRAMENT
My will to watch, my will to pray.
Vain is the consecrated vesture;
Vain the high and holy gesture;
Vain the proven and perfect spell
Enchanting heaven, enchaining hell.
Unyoked the horses from the car
Wherein I waged celestial war:
Mine angel sheathes again his sword
At the Interdiction of the Lord.
Even hell is shut, lest spite and strife
Should show my soul a way to life.
Hope dies; faith flickers and is gone.
Love weeps, then turns its soul to stone.
All nearest, highest, holiest things
Drop off; the soul must lose her wings,
And, crippled, find, with no one clue
The infinite maze to travel through,
The goal unguessed, the path untrod,
And stand unhelmed, unarmed, unshod,
Naked before the Unknown God.
Oh! stertorous, oh! strangling strife
That cleaves to love, that clings to life!
The Will is broken, falls afar
Extinct as an accurséd star.
The Self, one moment held behind,
Whirls like a dead leaf in the wind
Down the Abyss. The soul is drawn
To that Dark Night that is the dawn
Through halls of patience, palaces
191