Natural Theology

Related poetry:

1. Caliban upon Setebos or, Natural Theology in the Island “Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such a one as thyself.” (David, Psalms 50.21) [‘Will sprawl, now that the heat of day is best, Flat on his belly in the pit’s much mire, With elbows wide, fists clenched to prop his chin. And, while he kicks both feet in the cool slush, And feels about […]...
2. Juvenilia, An Ode to Natural Beauty There is a power whose inspiration fills Nature’s fair fabric, sun – and star-inwrought, Like airy dew ere any drop distils, Like perfume in the laden flower, like aught Unseen which interfused throughout the whole Becomes its quickening pulse and principle and soul. Now when, the drift of old desire renewing, Warm tides flow northward […]...
3. Theology There is a heaven, for ever, day by day, The upward longing of my soul doth tell me so. There is a hell, I’m quite as sure; for pray If there were not, where would my neighbours go?...
4. Theology “No, the serpent did not Seduce Eve to the apple. All that’s simply Corruption of the facts. Adam ate the apple. Eve ate Adam. The serpent ate Eve. This is the dark intestine. The serpent, meanwhile, Sleeps his meal off in Paradise – Smiling to hear God’s querulous calling.”...
5. Good Friday O my chief good, How shall I measure out thy blood? How shall I count what thee befell, And each grief tell? Shall I thy woes Number according to thy foes? Or, since one star show’d thy first breath, Shall all thy death? Or shall each leaf, Which falls in Autumn, score a grief? Or […]...
6. Frying Pan's Theology Shock-headed blackfellow, Boy (on a pony). Snowflakes are falling Gentle and slow, Youngster says, “Frying Pan What makes it snow?” Frying Pan, confident, Makes the reply “Shake ‘im big flour bag Up in the sky!” “What! when there’s miles of it? Surely that’s brag. Who is there strong enough Shake such a bag?” “What parson […]...
7. Trust in the Unexpected Trust in the Unexpected By this was William Kidd Persuaded of the Buried Gold As One had testified Through this the old Philosopher His Talismanic Stone Discerned still withholden To effort undivine ‘Twas this allured Columbus When Genoa withdrew Before an Apparition Baptized America The Same afflicted Thomas When Deity assured ‘Twas better the perceiving […]...
8. Psalm 86 Thy gracious ear, O Lord, encline, O hear me I thee pray, For I am poor, and almost pine With need, and sad decay. Preserve my soul, for *I have trod Heb. I am good, loving, Thy waies, and love the just, a doer of good and Save thou thy servant O my God holy […]...
9. If It Is True What the Prophets Write If it is true, what the Prophets write, That the heathen gods are all stocks and stones, Shall we, for the sake of being polite, Feed them with the juice of our marrow-bones? And if Bezaleel and Aholiab drew What the finger of God pointed to their view, Shall we suffer the Roman and Grecian […]...
10. Natural Music The old voice of the ocean, the bird-chatter of little rivers, (Winter has given them gold for silver To stain their water and bladed green for brown to line their banks) >From different throats intone one language. So I believe if we were strong enough to listen without Divisions of desire and terror To the […]...
11. Something Childish, But Very Natural If I had but two little wings And were a little feathery bird, To you I’d fly, my dear! But thoughts like these are idle things, And I stay here. But in my sleep to you I fly: I’m always with you in my sleep! The world is all one’s own. But then one wakes, […]...
12. Natural therapy the great thing about the tall white daisy Is that it knows how to laugh at itself Some flowers for all their rich displays Won’t preen themselves without a primness In their sap – nor let their stalks abide Bending this way that way in the thick wind The large daisy is happy to be […]...
13. Natural Magic WE air tired who follow after Phantasy and truth that flies: You with only look and laughter Stain our hearts with richest dyes. When you break upon our study Vanish all our frosty cares; As the diamond deep grows ruddy, Filled with morning unawares. With the stuff that dreams are made of But an empty […]...
14. Were natural mortal lady Were natural mortal lady Who had so little time To pack her trunk and order The great exchange of clime How rapid, how momentous What exigencies were But nature will be ready And have an hour to spare. To make some trifle fairer That was too fair before Enchanting by remaining, And by departure more....
15. Sunset at Night is natural Sunset at Night is natural But Sunset on the Dawn Reverses Nature Master So Midnight’s due at Noon. Eclipses be predicted And Science bows them in But do one face us suddenly Jehovah’s Watch is wrong....
16. Chapter Headings Plane Tales From the Hills Look, you have cast out Love! What Gods are these You bid me please? The Three in One, the One in Three? Not so! To my own Gods I go. It may be they shall give me greater ease Than your cold Christ and tangled Trinities. Lispeth. When the earth […]...
17. Sonnet XXXV: Some, Misbelieving To Miracle Some, misbelieving and profane in love, When I do speak of miracles by thee, May say, that thou art flattered by me, Who only write my skill in verse to prove. See miracles, ye unbelieving, see A dumb-born Muse made t’express the mind, A cripple hand to write, yet lame by kind, One […]...
18. Looking Upwards in a Storm God of my life, to Thee I call, Afflicted at Thy feet I fall; When the great water-floods prevail, Leave not my trembling heart to fail! Friend of the friendless and the faint, Where should I lodge my deep complaint, Where but with Thee, whose open door Invites the helpless and the poor! Did ever […]...
19. I cautious, scanned my little life I cautious, scanned my little life I winnowed what would fade From what would last till Heads like mine Should be a-dreaming laid. I put the latter in a Barn The former, blew away. I went one winter morning And lo – my priceless Hay Was not upon the “Scaffold” Was not upon the “Beam” […]...
20. The Verdicts Not in the thick of the fight, Not in the press of the odds, Do the heroes come to their height, Or we know the demi-gods. That stands over till peace. We can only perceive Men returned from the seas, Very grateful for leave. They grant us sudden days Snatched from their business of war; […]...
21. The Pentagram [Dedicated to George Raffalovich] In the Years of the Primal Course, in the dawn of terrestrial Birth, Man mastered the mammoth and horse, and Man was the Lord of the Earth. He made him an hollow skin from the heart of an holy tree, He compassed the earth therien, and Man was the Lord of […]...
22. A Brief History of Gods First, we worshipped the inanimate. Next, we learned to worship the gods Later, we discovered the Deity. Then, dazzled by our own Reason We returned to the inanimate And ended up worshipping anything, From football to economic growth....
23. Dependence To keep the lamp alive, With oil we fill the bowl; ‘Tis water makes the willow thrive, And grace that feeds the soul. The Lord’s unsparing hand Supplies the living stream; It is not at our own command, But still derived from Him. Beware of Peter’s word, Nor confidently say, “I never will deny Thee, […]...
24. SONNET OF AUTUMN THEY say to me, thy clear and crystal eyes: “Why dost thou love me so, strange lover mine?” Be sweet, be still! My heart and soul despise All save that antique brute-like faith of thine; And will not bare the secret of their shame To thee whose hand soothes me to slumbers long, Nor their […]...
25. Ballade of a Special Edition He comes; I hear him up the street Bird of ill omen, flapping wide The pinion of a printed sheet, His hoarse note scares the eventide. Of slaughter, theft, and suicide He is the herald and the friend; Now he vociferates with pride A double murder in Mile End! A hanging to his soul is […]...
26. The Sinner Lord, how I am all ague, when I seek What I have treasur’d in my memory! Since, if my soul make even with the week, Each seventh note by right is due to thee. I find there quarries of pil’d vanities, But shreds of holiness, that dare not venture To show their face, since cross […]...
27. The Sick God I In days when men had joy of war, A God of Battles sped each mortal jar; The peoples pledged him heart and hand, From Israel’s land to isles afar. II His crimson form, with clang and chime, Flashed on each murk and murderous meeting-time, And kings invoked, for rape and raid, His fearsome aid […]...
28. Sardis (Revelations, iii. 1-6) “Write to Sardis,” saith the Lord, “And write what He declares, He whose Spirit, and whose word, Upholds the seven stars: All thy works and ways I search, Find thy zeal and love decay’d; Thou art call’d a living church, But thou art cold and dead. “Watch, remember, seek, and strive, Exert […]...
29. Thou Art Indeed Just, Lord, If I Contend Justus quidem tu es, Domine, si disputem tecum: Verumtamen justa loquar ad te: Quare via impiorum prosperatur? &c. Thou art indeed just, Lord, if I contend With thee; but, sir, so what I plead is just. Why do sinners’ ways prosper? and why must Disappointment all I endeavour end? Wert thou my enemy, O thou […]...
30. H. Baptism II Since, Lord, to thee A narrow way and little gate Is all the passage, on my infancy Thou didst lay hold, and antedate My faith in me. O let me still Write thee great God, and me a child: Let me be soft and supple to thy will, Small to my self, to others mild, […]...
31. 233. Song-O were I on Parnassus Hill O, WERE I on Parnassus hill, Or had o’ Helicon my fill, That I might catch poetic skill, To sing how dear I love thee! But Nith maun be my Muse’s well, My Muse maun be thy bonie sel’, On Corsincon I’ll glowr and spell, And write how dear I love thee. Then come, sweet […]...
32. Psalm 82 God the supreme Governor; or, Magistrates warned. Among th’ assemblies of the great A greater Ruler takes his seat; The God of heav’n, as Judge, surveys Those gods on earth, and all their ways. Why will ye, then, frame wicked laws? Or why support th’ unrighteous cause? When will ye once defend the poor, That […]...
33. Hymn Before Action The earth is full of anger, The seas are dark with wrath, The Nations in their harness Go up against our path: Ere yet we draw the blade, Jehovah of the Thunders, Lord God of Battles, aid! High lust and froward bearing, Proud heart, rebellious brow Deaf ear and soul uncaring, We seek My mercy […]...
34. Sonnet II VNquiet thought, whom at the first I bred, Of th’inward bale of my loue pined hart: And sithens haue with sighes and sorrowes fed, Till greater then my wombe thou woxen art. Breake forth at length out of the inner part, In which thou lurkest lyke to vipers brood: And seeke some succour both to […]...
35. The Future Peace and Glory of the Church (Isaiah, ix. 15-20) Hear what God the Lord hath spoken, “O my people, faint and few, Comfortless, afflicted, broken, Fair abodes I build for you. Thorns of heartfelt tribulation Shall no more perplex your ways; You shall name your walls, Salvation, And your gates shall all be Praise. “There, like streams that feed the garden, […]...
36. Soup Song How I make my soup: I draw water from a tap. . . I am not an artist. And the water is not so much Drawn as allowed to fall, and to capture itself in a pot. Perhaps not so much captured, as allowed to gather Itself from its stream; the way it falls that […]...
37. The Quip The merry world did on a day With his train-bands and mates agree To meet together where I lay, And all in sport to jeer at me. First, Beauty crept into a rose, Which when I plucked not, “Sir,” said she, “Tell me, I pray, whose hands are those?” But thou shalt answer, Lord, for […]...
38. Prayer I ASK good things that I detest, With speeches fair; Heed not, I pray Thee, Lord, my breast, But hear my prayer. I say ill things I would not say – Things unaware: Regard my breast, Lord, in Thy day, And not my prayer. My heart is evil in Thy sight: My good thoughts flee: […]...
39. The Fifth Ode Of Horace. Lib. I Quis multa gracilis te puer in Rosa Rendred almost word for word without Rhyme according to the Latin Measure, as near as the Language permit. WHAT slender Youth bedew’d with liquid odours Courts thee on Roses in some pleasant Cave, Pyrrha for whom bind’st thou In wreaths thy golden Hair, Plain in thy neatness; O […]...
40. Psalm 45 The glory of Christ. My Savior and my King, Thy beauties are divine; Thy lips with blessings overflow, And every grace is thine. Now make thy glory known, Gird on thy dreadful sword, And ride in majesty to spread The conquests of thy word. Strike through thy stubborn foes, Or melt their hearts t’ obey, […]...