O world grown indolent and crass,I stand upon your bleak morassOf incredulity and cryYour lack of faith is but a lie.If you but brushed the scales apartThat cloud your eyes and clinch your heartThere is no telling what grace mightBe leveled to your clearer sight;Nor what stupendous choir breakUpon your soul till you should ache(If you but let your fingers veer,And raised to heaven a listening ear)In utter pain in every limbTo know and sing as they that hymn.If men would set their lips to prayerWith that delight with which they swear,Heaven and earth as bow and string,Would meet, would be attuned and sing.
We are diseased, trunk, branch, and shoot;A sickness gathers at the rootOf us. We flaunt a gaudy fruitBut maggots wrangle at the core.We cry for angels; yet wherefore,Who raise no Jacobs any more? . . .No men with eyes quick to perceiveThe Shining Thing, clutch at its sleeve,
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