Blessings

God bless the little orchard brown
Where the sap stirs these quickening days.
Soon in a white and rosy gown
The trees will give great praise.

God knows I have it in my mind,
The white house with the golden eaves.
God knows since it is left behind
That something grieves and grieves.

God keep the small house in his care,
The garden bordered all in box,
Where primulas and wallflowers are
And crocuses in flocks.

God keep the little rooms that ope
One to another, swathed in green,
Where honeysuckle lifts her cup
With jessamine between.

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poem by Katharine Tynan
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Sheep and Lambs

All in the April evening,
April airs were abroad;
The sheep with their little lambs
Passed me by on the road.

The sheep with their little lambs
Passed me by on the road;
All in the April evening
I thought on the Lamb of God.

The lambs were weary and crying
With a weak, human cry.
I thought on the Lamb of God
Going meekly to die.

Up in the blue, blue mountains
Dewy pastures are sweet;
Rest for the little bodies,
Rest for the little feet.

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poem by Katharine Tynan
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The Refreshment

If I could have foreseen this hour,
What terror and anguish I had seen!
And not this time of joy at flower,
Cool waters and a garden green.

All day the battle in the East
Thunders. Dear Angels, keep him well!
His mother sits as to a feast.
O heart of steel invulnerable!

All night I sleep the young child's sleep
And waken to the robin's song,
Blithe as the bird. Dear Angels, keep
My darling the sharp spears among.

Ah now, I know whose Arms enfold,
I rest on such a mighty Heart;
He hides my eyes lest they behold,
In a most heavenly place apart.

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poem by Katharine Tynan
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Quiet Eyes

The boys come home, come home from war,
With quiet eyes for quiet things --
A child, a lamb, a flower, a star,
A bird that softly sings.

Young faces war-worn and deep-lined,
The satin smoothness past recall;
Yet out of sight is out of mind
For the worst wrong of all.

As nightmare dreams that pass with sleep,
The horror and grief intolerable.
The unremembering young eyes keep
Their innocence. All is well!

The worldling's eyes are dusty dim,
The eyes of sin are weary and cold,
The fighting boy brings home with him
The unsullied eyes of old.

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poem by Katharine Tynan
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Christmas in the year of the War

NEVERTHELESS this Year of Grief
The Tree of God's in leaf.

The stem, the branch quickeneth
With sap, this year of Death.

For in the time of the flowering thorn
The Babe, the Babe, is born!

Christ's folk, look up, be not dismayed,
The Lord's in the cattle shed.

He comes, a little trembling One,
To a world else lost, undone.

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poem by Katharine Tynan
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Mater Dei

She looked to east, she looked to west,
Her eyes, unfathomable, mild,
That saw both worlds, came home to rest,­
Home to her own sweet child.
God's golden head was at her breast.

What need to look o'er land and sea?
What could the winged ships bring to her?
What gold or gems of price might be,
Ivory or miniver,
Since God Himself lay on her knee?

What could th' intense blue heaven keep
To draw her eyes and thoughts so high?
All heaven was where her Boy did leap,
Where her foot quietly
Went rocking the dear God asleep.

The angel folk fared up and down
A Jacob's Ladder hung between

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poem by Katharine Tynan
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Of An Orchard

Good is an Orchard, the Saint saith,
To meditate on life and death,
With a cool well, a hive of bees,
A hermit's grot below the trees.

Good is an Orchard: very good,
Though one should wear no monkish hood.
Right good, when Spring awakes her flute,
And good in yellowing time of fruit.

Very good in the grass to lie
And see the network 'gainst the sky,
A living lace of blue and green,
And boughs that let the gold between.

The bees are types of souls that dwell
With honey in a quiet cell;
The ripe fruit figures goldenly
The soul's perfection in God's eye.

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poem by Katharine Tynan
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The Wild Geese

Wild geese fly overhead
In the wild Autumn weather.
Souls of the newly-dead
Crying and flying together.

Home from the last great fight,
The souls of the Irish farin'
With a wild heart in the night,
A grey eye turned to Erin.

High and high in the sky,
From the red fields of slaughter
Ever they fly and cry
For the brown bog, the grey water.

Wild geese in the wild even,
Steady and strong their flight,
Their beds are made in Heaven,
All of the down white.

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poem by Katharine Tynan
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The Young Soldier

Since you were so young, child, I shall
Not fear your noon or even-fall,
Nor dread you are taken unawares,
Nor weary Heaven with many prayers.

I shall not wake at night afraid
Of where your darling head is laid,
Nor say: 'He finds the wind too rough,
Dear God!' for now the wind's left off.

I shall have ease though lightnings leap,
Nor hear the thunder in my sleep,
Nor dread the crying of the seas,
Nor any mountain precipice.

God pity her who lies awake
Unquiet for some darling sake!
Soft sleeps my little son to-night,
Where many stars make candlelight!

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poem by Katharine Tynan
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The Gardener

For Violet

In the garden she hath found
Herb of grace and fever-few;
Woundwort there doth much abound,
Heartsease too.

Where she laid dead things away
In the chilly earth, what stir!
Whisper of Spring-time, green and gay,
Comes to her.

All Sweet-Nancies, daffodils,
Talking in their beds below
Of sweet vales and shining hills
Whither they go.

In the garden there's no grief;
God walks there and He is kind,

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poem by Katharine Tynan
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