POETRY.
OXFORD.
0 HOLY Land to which I longed to go, Long, long ago !
On Israel's stony mountains there to trace
The prints of Grace;
From Hebron's starting-point each rock to see Where holy footsteps trod and bled for me, On to the shades of dark Gethsemane,
And darker Golgotha—
I could not go.
Visions there are of mingled joy and woe, That haunt our dreams, unrealised below.
Yet oft I think amid these sacred walls,
And solemn calls—
These airy pinnacles entranced in light, These bells that warn of Time's eternal flight, These moon-lit, soul-lit, high-ascended spires, That take first morning-rays, eve's latest fires, May there not be For such as me Places of memory, hallowed, old, divine, Where one may ope a door, and find a shrine, Or climb a tower, and see an Eden shine?
Places of beauty so unearthly fair, That, best-beloved, our Holy Land is there, 'Mid our own people ? There, in mist and rime, And tenderest fancy, mystic veil of Time ; There in the home of saints, whose old-world fire Lives on to light and kindle young desire, While still-expanding truth new vesture wears, Fresh revelations with advance of years; There, where we hear the highest, holiest call, There is the Land most holy, after all. A. G. B.
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