Here do I stand in office, yet accurst,--
My heart of lust to guard God's holiest gift,
And plead in prayer from lips all stained with sin,--
Pleading for you who purer are than I!
O direst judgment from the God of grace!
My inmost soul doth long for His forgiveness,
I yearn for sign of His compassion,
Yet cannot bear His mercy in the Grail....
But now the hour is nigh! I seem to see
A ray of glory fall upon the Cup!
The veil is raised! The sacred stream that flows
Within the crystal, gloriously shines
With radiance heaven-born. But as it glows,
I feel the well-spring of the blood divine
Pouring in floods into my anguished heart.
And then the full tide of my sinful blood
Ebbs out in tumult wild through this deep wound
Here in my side. It leaps in bounds of pain,
Like torments of the lowest depths of hell,--
Through this deep wound. Like His own wound it is,
Thrust through with bitter stroke of that same Spear,
And in the self-same place from which His tears
Of burning blood wept over man's disgrace
In holiest pity and divinest love;
And now from me, the highest office holding
And charged with holiest trust of God's good grace,--
From me the hot, impassioned blood is surging,
Renewed again by that first awful sin.
Pages:
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44