C S Lewis
The Meteorite
Among the hills a meteorite Lies huge; and moss has overgrown, And wind and rain with touches light Made soft, the contours of the stone. Thus easily can Earth digest A cinder of sidereal
Re-adjustment
I thought there would be a grave beauty, a sunset splendour In being the last of one’s kind: a topmost moment as one watched The huge wave curving over Atlantis, the shrouded barge Turning
An Expostulation
Against too many writers of science fiction Why did you lure us on like this, Light-year on light-year, through the abyss, Building (as though we cared for size!) Empires that cover galaxies If at
On Being Human
Angelic minds, they say, by simple intelligence Behold the Forms of nature. They discern Unerringly the Archtypes, all the verities Which mortals lack or indirectly learn. Transparent in primordial truth, unvarying, Pure Earthness and
On a Vulgar Error
No. It’s an impudent falsehood. Men did not Invariably think the newer way Prosaic Mad, inelegant, or what not. Was the first pointed arch esteemed a blot Upon the church? Did anybody say How
After Prayers, Lie Cold
Arise my body, my small body, we have striven Enough, and He is merciful; we are forgiven. Arise small body, puppet-like and pale, and go, White as the bed-clothes into bed, and cold as
Evolutionary Hymn
Lead us, Evolution, lead us Up the future’s endless stair; Chop us, change us, prod us, weed us. For stagnation is despair: Groping, guessing, yet progressing, Lead us nobody knows where. Wrong or justice,
Prelude to Space
An Epithaliamium So Man, grown vigorous now, Holds himself ripe to breed, Daily devises how To ejaculate his seed And boldly fertilize The black womb of the unconsenting skies. Some now alive expect (I
The Country of the Blind
Hard light bathed them-a whole nation of eyeless men, Dark bipeds not aware how they were maimed. A long Process, clearly, a slow curse, Drained through centuries, left them thus. At some transitional stage,
The Condemned
There is a wildness still in England that will not feed In cages; it shrinks away from the touch of the trainer’s hand, Easy to kill, not easy to tame. It will never breed
Cliche Came Out of its Cage
1 You said ‘The world is going back to Paganism’. Oh bright Vision! I saw our dynasty in the bar of the House Spill from their tumblers a libation to the Erinyes, And Leavis
Science-fiction Cradlesong
By and by Man will try To get out into the sky, Sailing far beyond the air From Down and Here to Up and There. Stars and sky, sky and stars Make us feel
As the Ruin Falls
All this is flashy rhetoric about loving you. I never had a selfless thought since I was born. I am mercenary and self-seeking through and through: I want God, you, all friends, merely to