Dorothea Spears 

                  Habits

Habits are the habiliments

With which we clothe our personalities.

Each man makes his own

To fit the image of the self he sees

Within his mirror.

The habits that he wears confirm

The self he is, and wise men learn

To choose with care

The clothes they wear to shape the form.

 

Dorothea Spears

23.4.1969

                    Haiku

              (After Harold Stewart)

Deception

Within the sun is warm against the pane –

But here without the bitter wind complain!

 

The winter sun tapped on the pane and said

“How warm it is!” But Wind warned “Stay in Bed!”

 

Winter Dusk

Against the sky four tall bare lime trees are

Entangling crescent moon and evening star.

 

Reality

I thought I saw a brown bird by the wall

But it was only a brown leaf after all.

 

Exotic

Beside the stream, disdaining indigenous trees

A tall cypress is showing its knees.

Surprise

The children made a snowman. Hazy Dawn

Surprised, has found him standing on the lawn.

 

Truth?

The small dog charged the snowman excitedly –

She thought he was as real as you think me.

 

Message

Every time I pass your house (God mind it)

I leave a blessing. Do you ever find it?

 

Betrayal

He was my friend and betrayed his trust.

My once untarnished sword is red with rust.

 

Haiku

(After Harold Stewart)

 

Deception

Within the sun is warm against the pane –

But here without the bitter wind complain!

 

The winter sun tapped on the pane and said

“How warm it is!” But Wind warned “Stay in Bed!”

 

Winter Dusk

Against the sky four tall bare lime trees are

Entangling crescent moon and evening star.

 

Reality

I thought I saw a brown bird by the wall

But it was only a brown leaf after all.

 

Exotic

Beside the stream, disdaining indigenous trees

A tall cypress is showing its knees.

Surprise

The children made a snowman. Hazy Dawn

Surprised, has found him standing on the lawn.

 

Truth?

The small dog charged the snowman excitedly –

She thought he was as real as you think me.

 

Message

Every time I pass your house (God mind it)

I leave a blessing. Do you ever find it?

 

Betrayal

He was my friend and betrayed his trust.

My once untarnished sword is red with rust.

Halfway A-Down The Glen

 

Halfway a-down the dusky glen,

Halfway a-down the glen,

We sat us down to say farewell:

My heart remembers when.

 

We sat us down beneath the trees,

The pine and blue gum trees,

That bent in blessing over us:

My heart remembers these.

 

The shadowed mountains far above;

The Bay away below-

A sapphire in an emerald set-

My heart remembers so!

 

The dappled sunlight sought for us,

Half shaded by the bough

That learnt to listen while we spoke:

My heart remembers how.

 

But now I go a-down no more,

A-down the glen no more;

For fear my longing heart should break

Remembering days afore.

Hands Of Night

Softly the tender hands of night

Caress the world day-worn,

Smoothing her wrinkles, putting right

The scars that Day has torn;

 

Healing the wounds and making fair,

With magic in her touch,

The ugly places, raw and bare,

That Day has hurt so much.

 

Oh! Night has wondrous tender hands

To comfort, heal and bless;

Will Death, I wonder, break Life’s bands

With such a soft caress?

                                                                                           Happiness is a Rose

Happiness is a rose

Of deep dark red

That grows in my garden

And glows in the light

Of the sun,

Merging into night

Around the stamened centre’s

Golden pollen, where

The velvet bee sips

The scented air.

Happiness is a rose

That grows in the garden

(or in the heart)

But take care

Lest the moment pass…

It doesn’t weather well

Or live long in glass.

                Happy Thief

A thief am I, though no one knows –

I steal the fragrance of the rose;

The privet’s perfume, scent of broom,

The tapestries of Summer’s loom.

From all the vendors in the street;

I pilfer perfumes wildly sweet;

The radiant larkspurs’ rainbow hues.

The tall delphiniums heavenly blues,

St Joseph lilies’ incense (this

Envelops every sense in bliss!)

My five accomplices I train

To gather every lovely grain.

No beauty’s safe from my two eyes.

My ears bring hourly fresh supplies

Of pleasant sound. My faithful nose

Is quick rich treasure to disclose.

And in the Spring, when comes to life

The earth, with flames of colour rife,

While others pilfer Nature’s bowers

With fingers avid for her flowers,

My hands lie idle on my knee …

I bring the whole veld home with me!

         Having Overcome

Having overcome fear: having accepted

Whatever was and is and is to be

As part of the inevitable pattern -

Inalienable unity of three -

What then? The indivisibility

So seen of yesterday, to-day, to-morrow

Of unlamentable loss, ungloated gain,

Evoke no brief unrest of gladness 0 sorrow.

As the sun is undefaced by rain or night

So joy is indestructible by pain

 

Dorothea Spears

He was a man who spoke my language

 

He was a man who spoke my language.

Words kindled between us and took fire

And lit a light of understanding

That brought the syllables to life

And gave the letters meaning, as we spoke them.

We sat there under the trees, drinking tea

Discussing many things – unselfconsciously –

Which was as it should be.

And there was nothing to signify but sight

That he was dark and I was light.

His education was higher than ours

His thoughts as deep, his manners as fair

Yet he could never occupy a chair

Beside me in a public place, a concert, or a play

Nor share a meal, though any rogue with white skin

Would be allowed in.

These are the people our masters are training to be

Our servants, to take his place.

        He Won’t Be Coming Home

 

He won’t be coming home for lunch today.

Put his plate away.

He lay on the road like a rag doll flung aside

When some impetuous child has tired of its game,

Face down, the warm and lifeless limbs flung wide…

I do not know his name nor whence he came

Nor whither bound, but this was not his goal,

This goal he found, when he set forth this morning,

Pulsing with life, and young and free and whole.

He had no presentment, I think, no warning.

Time was his toy, the holidays just begun,

Good to be alive with the weather fine,

A day for adventure and friends and food and fun…

He might have been your son. He might have been mine.

He won’t be coming home for lunch today.

He won’t be coming…put his plate away.

               Healing

I will be silent and will lean

Myself against all space

To feel the healing of the heart

Within that vast embrace.

I will be silent, now, nor strive

For individual peace

Against the throbbing breast of life

This strife will find release.

I will be silent now, and cease

The search for a lesser goal

For peace is indivisible,

And healing is making whole.

 

Dorothea Spears

                Heart’s Ease

A warm night after the rain; I walk the streets

And smell the new-washed air that emanates

From roses in the gardens of the town

And from the bedrooms where the young girls lie

Wakeful in tented sheets, their hearts aflame

For lovers of their still undreamt-of dreams.

Another shower sends me back indoors

To my own garden mirrored in the rain;

I close the windows in a sudden chill

And drink my cocoa in a spindrift shawl.

 

Morning again and pansies barely dry

Are little battered flags of brilliance

Growing in cracks between my paving-stones.

Heart’s-ease, you called them, and for the love of you

I touched their petals with a gentle hand

And picked the weathered dead-heads carefully.

 

 

My garden is a meadow lush with weeds

In whose green depths such hidden flowers

As one day will suffice for all your needs.

I thought so once, sadly uncertain now

I cherish flowers that thrived on my neglect

And throw the weeds upon the rising heap.

Now, in my seventieth year, I am ashamed

Because of all the things I have not done,

The sins committed in my carelessness;

You told me once my greatest talent was

Simply for loving, and I need to know

That hearts-ease pansies still have the power to heal.

               Heaven is Whole

The Kingdom of Heaven will never come on earth

Until the hearts of men can understand

That Heaven is one through gate of second birth

Which may be entered only hand in hand.

Nor is security for any man

Until there is security for all

Within one master and inclusive plan:

And he’s a saboteur who builds a wall

To separate mankind, and he is blind

Who cannot see that Heaven is a whole

Who seeks to shun his fellow men and find

A separate heaven for his little soul:

Nor any resting place for Peace, the dove,

While separation sabotages love.

 

Veritas

Constantia, C.P

           Here is happiness

Here is happiness, to wake

Before the dawn and watch the day break,

To lie relaxed and know

There's still another hour or two to go,

Another hour or two

Belonging to no one else but you.

Before the duties of the day begin

To hem you in:

A solitude, a silence, a retreat.

A trysting place in time, to meet

Yourself, undrugged by sleep

Here is happiness to keep.

      

Dorothea Spears

                Here is Joy

Here is neither happiness nor sorrow,

Only joy, the consumated vow,

To-day and yesterday, unseen tomorrow

Meet and merge in one eternal now.

Sorrow has no substance; pain is fleeting;

Happiness, that painted butterfly,

Is gauze against a single candle meeting,

Transient as the tremor of a sigh.

The noisy patriotisms of the nations,

All the problems of modernity

Cease to shake the world to its foundations.

Against the pattern of eternity,

Only unity in God is true,

And joy is where this consciousness comes through.

          

Dorothea Spears

           Here Is Mystery

 

I could understand if pleasure paled

Before the radiance of a star:

But to fade in the light of a naked cross –

Here silence and mystery are.

 

That the biggest things of earth grow small,

Dwarfed by the sun, or mighty sea,

I could comprehend, but lo! … they wane

In the shade of a nail-pierced tree!

 

I can fathom men drawn by some mighty force

Of beauty or love, but I find no gloss

For the magnetism that draws a world

To the foot of a blood stained cross.

 

I find no gloss – but the crimson drops

About its foot have come to flower:

And I kneel in the dust with a world of men

And bless its healing power.

          Here Lies the Artist

Here lies the Artist;

his hand stilled forever

and all the beauty rampant in his brain

will waken never.

The visions, all the splendid dreams

that beckoned his endeavour –

dream the colour of sunset and of dawn,

splashed with moonlight, shot with rainbow gleams

and glory – are lost forever.

 

Probe, dissect, and analyse at will

this brain, with all the cunning known

to mortals, but the music’s still,

the splendour flown.

 

Can Death destroy such rapture

as he himself could never fully capture?

 

 

Can Death erase

Such loveliness as homed within this eager heart

and leave no trace?

 

Earth to earth they say, and dust to dust …

Back to the Mother of all he goes:

and the hand that strove to line his dreams

may some day make a living rose.

 

But the heart that I loved, and the brain that planned,

and the spirit like a flame –

What shall become of the unborn beauty

now that the Artist is but a name?

 

Will this return to some common Whole

as the body to the sod

to come to flower at last

incarnate in another soul?

Is this the image of God? 

   Here Summer Does Not Fulfil the     Promise of Spring

What shall I say

Now that the young green ecstasy of Spring

Has given way

To summer’s burgeoning;

Now that the neat young bud of the rose

Grows blowsy ere the day’s close?

 

What shall I say

Now that the leaves are tarnished on the oak,

Now that the gay

And erstwhile royal cloak

Of the bougainvillea’s thread-bare,

And heavy hangs the dead air?

 

What shall I say

Now Beauty’s overdrawn her long account?

How shall she pay

Hope’s unredeemed amount

Now that fulfilment has betrayed

The promises that Spring made?

 

Can Autumn’s prodigal purse

Summer’s overdraft reimburse?

                 Heritage

There are centuries of trees between us,

And fields of flowers,

And hours of sun and shade

Have made us what we are.

Sometimes we seem to touch,

You and I,

When the wind stops

And tree tops blend with the blue sky.

But roses are in my blood,

And daffodils and wild thyme, and you

Will never understand the necessity

Of hills for me,

And the need of root and branch and bole

And leaf and tree

And grass and bud and blossom

To make me whole.

 

Dorothea Spears

               High moments

There are times the old familiar beauty

Beats against the being with a call

So poignant that the startled senses flutter

Breathless with the wonder of it all.

Carved from a giant opal, or mother-of-pearl,

Or moonstone, maybe, caught in a trice of time,

Sky and valley and sea and mountain merge

To mark a mortal moment more sublime.

Is it some magical quality in the scene

At this particular juncture of time and place

Or some imperative, unique awareness.

Some inner vision from an outer space,

A purer air, a quality behind

That's always there if we were not so blind?

 

Dorothea Spears

                His Dog

Lie down, Gyp… don’t gaze at me

With that expectant stare…

It’s no good going to the gate –

The Master won’t be there.

 

You think because he’s come home twice

When you had given him up

That he will always come again,

You optimistic pup.

 

And so, at every passing step

That echoes down the street

You raise your faithful head in hope

That it may be his feet.

 

And every night at six o’clock

You lie and watch the door

How could you know you’ll never hear

The step you listen for?

That Master isn’t coming back,

Not ever, any more?

               Holy Ground

I stood upon the heights in splendour bound,

The sky, the sea, the mountains, all a-flame

Before the setting sun. In awed accolade

I bowed my heart in reverence profound,

And wrapped in a veil of misty cloud around

My soul’s face, in a sudden whelm of shame.

And from the burning sky a clear voice came –

“Take off thy shoes for this is hold ground.”

 

Once more upon my humble task I trod,

My heart upon the God-lit height.

Then, suddenly – a voice – a radiance bright-

“This, too, is holy ground, this lowly sod.”

And in the glory of that flaming light

My soul fell on its knee and talked with God.

           Homo Looks for Liberty

Through all the years for one thing have I sought –

a priceless gift, unsold, unbegged, unbought;

a wraith that beckons and eludes, and mocks

Desire with phantom visions all but caught.

 

                                    I

There was a garden when the world was young

where Beauty, with a careless rapture, flung

her radiant cloak across the dazzled earth,

ere ever Azrael’s first dirge was sung.

 

The phials of creation’s flowers spilled

their virgin fragrance in that garden hilled

and valed with sylvan bloom; from morn till night

the singing of the birds was never stilled.

 

And “Here,” thought One, “Shall man be well content

to tread my lavish meadows, flower-besprent,

to walk my hills and dales at evening tide

and sleep at will, all heaven for his tent.”

“And lest the awful splendour of the night

or of the rising sun’s impassioned might

shouldst overwhelm his littleness with fear,

he shall have one to share his dark and light.”

 

“And he shall be the lord of all that’s wrought:

but lest he grow too arrogant in his thought,

forgetting me, one simple law I frame,

and by this single law shall he be taught.”

 

And so I walked in Eden’s close, and all

the wonder of the world was at my call,

the glorious day, kind night and tender dusk;

and bird and beast and fish were in my thrall.

 

Think you in such a fair enheavened spot

I should have been contented with my lot?

Ah, so I should, but for that single law,

the rigid barrier of one Thou shalt not.   

 

 

Against this bar I beat my will in vain,

And bruised my soul with self-inflicted pain,

Till all that Eden was become a cage

and I a captive, who a king should reign.

 

Men say it was the serpent tempted me

to eat the fruit of that forbidden tree…

No, ‘twas that same elusive, mocking wraith,

the mad, unreasoning lust for Liberty.

 

Man’s heart is rebel and itself would be

it’s only god, and own no fealty

to other law: and so I ate and dreamed

that in defying law I should be free.

 

I took the fruit, and dreamed my fetters broken

in shattering the law that served as token

of my subservience. All day I dreamed

until, with eventide, my name was spoken.

 

 

My name was spoken in the eventide-

and suddenly grim Fear walked by my side

and hailed me subject. Surely then I knew

How treacherously my brave dream had lied.

 

Then came the angel with the flaming sword:

Ah, fool was I to cut the silken cord

and bind me with mortality’s iron chain!

For man my change, but never lack, a lord.

 

                                    II

There were twelve brothers once, eleven free,

and one was sold into captivity:

yet these eleven were the slaves at last

and to the captive one must bow the knee.

 

                                    III

There was a storied land beside the Nile

wherein I lingered for accursed while,

until my pride had won a Pharaoh’s hate:

There Freedom came to me with mocking smile…

Then I exulted, “having put a sea

between my erstwhile tyrant’s hand and me

the priceless benefaction shall be mine,

and I, at last, shall sup with Liberty!”

 

But even as I strove in that wild place

to clasp her, like the evanescent lace

that’s worked by sun and shadow, she was gone;

as a mirage upon the desert’s face.

 

And I was left with empty, outstretched hand,

yet crying still for some vague promised land

where freedom dwelt: my lesson still unlearned,

in forty years I did not understand.

 

                                    IV

Many a sea I’ve crossed since Egypt, wooing

the same old dream, the same dear wraith pursuing;

and she has led me through a cryptic maze,

and conjured up strange scenes for my undoing.

 

 

 

                                    V

There was a land with roses fair bedight.

The blossoms quarrelled and there fell a blight

Upon that garden thirty years. Ah, fools

What matter if a rose be red or white?

 

                                    VI

For Henry valiant the monks I smote;

for freedom and for Mary, turned my coat:

and then for Liberty, at Cromwell’s hest,

a kingly head I severed at the throat.

 

                                    VII

For dreaming Liberty’s a fickle guide,

hither and thither swaying with the tide:

to divers men she turns a differing face-

a dream… a simple maid… a regicide.

 

 

Her followers raise and level thrones, and stain

God’s altars with the blood of martyrs slain.

Yet is she but a phantom, but a name

created by man’s heaven-aspiring brain.

 

                                    VIII

Within the kingdom of the fleur-de-lis

the mocking phantom came and beckoned me.

“’Tis but a pack of useless heads,” she cried,

“that separates yourself from Liberty!”

 

And so I smote, and severed many a head,

And strewed the streets of Paris with her dead.

Insatiable, I laved in noble blood

and painted France’s snowy lily red.

 

To what avail? That Terror grim might ride

Unchecked, to tear the bridegroom from the bride;

that black suspicion might parade as king,

and man mistrust the neighbour at his side.

 

And when I sheathed at last my dripping sword

and would have claimed my so well earned reward,

the goddess, mocking, turned from me and fled,

and I was left with broken dreams to hoard.

 

However fast I fly she flieth faster

And leads me in the end but to disaster.

For this is truth, in spite of her sweet lies –

that man may change, but never lack, a master.

 

                                    IX

The hands of Liberty, incarnadined

with her disciples’ blood, still draw and bind

the hearts of men, and lead them where she will,

and in her service we are deaf and blind.

 

                                    X

Oh, Liberty has many a fine disguise

to cozen and compel both fools and wise;

and what will lead one man unto his doom

another generation will despise.

                                    XI

From out the old world, arid, overgrown

with rank injustice, by oppressive sown,

I dreamed of worlds uncultivated, free,

and rose, and turned my face to the unknown.

 

Upon those mighty waters of unrest

I set my sail to the golden West.

When heaven’s stars failed, the star of Liberty

was still the guiding angel of my quest.

 

An image of the goddess Liberty

I raised upon the margin of that sea,

with torch in hand, as in my dreams she stood

and to the golden Country guided me:

 

the golden Country, where harsh mortal kings

became, at last, but half-remembered things.

Now Gold, that powerful monarch, sits enthroned,

And in his thrall I labour without wings.

 

                                    XII

A will-o- wisp is Liberty, a star

to lead the honest traveller afar

with glimpses of her beauty through the mist,

with promises as vague as moonbeams are.

                                    XIII

Upon a night when the all-seeing eyes

of heaven were hid, she came with her fair lies.

“The night is black,” she breathed, “the river deep;

why linger in the serfdom you despise?”

 

But though the million eyes of Heaven were blind

there was no darkness for the questing mind.

No freedom hovered in those stygian depths,

nor even mute oblivion could I find.

 

                                    XIV

I came at length upon a sunbathed shore

with room for all, it seemed, and one thing more-

for “Here,” I thought, “in this unhampered spot

shall Liberty come freely to my door.”

 

I wooed her in the blinding, burning sun,

In star-gilt night, and in the evening dun.

I wooed her on the kopje, on the veld,

until I dreamed at last that she was won.

 

As far as eye could roam the world was mine,

the sheep, the Hottentots, the lowing kine,

and there was none to murmur “Thou shalt not,”

or mar the symmetry of life’s design.

 

But artful Liberty, entangled, fled

Across the plains and over mountains red

with deeper red than sunset… on I trod

along the crimson path that she had led.

 

Ah, Liberty, that drew from pastures fair

to massacre, confusion and despair,

to vanish in the wilderness at last

and leave us in the hands of Terror there!

 

Now some of us have broke a lance with Fate,

And some have compromised, and serve the State; while some still follow Liberty’s mad flight…

and some of us have sold our souls to Hate.

 

                                    XV

No siren’s song is there can claim a fraction

of Liberty’s invincible attraction…

and yet, how often is she but a cloak

to cover egoist dissatisfaction!

 

                                    XVI

On that sixth day into the world I came,

The ultimate creation, dust and flame:

But through the centuries the flame was quenched

And only smouldering dust was left, and shame.

 

For generations trampled in the mire,

A labourer unworthy of his hire;

for me no justice was in earth or heaven:

a belly full the height of my desire.

For czars and nobles – palaces and park.

For me – the frozen wilderness, the dark;

Till Liberty shook out my dying soul

and fanned to flame the near-extinguished spark.

 

The fire she stirred to life leapt up and spread,

consuming kings and palaces, and sped

across the land, a mad, devouring thing.

Now I am fuel its flame to be fed.

 

                                    XVII

When surly Mars would plunge the world in gloom

the same old war-cry leads us to our doom:

“For Liberty, sweet Liberty!” we cry,

And Liberty rewards us with – a tomb.

 

                                    XVIII

Yet I have followed her through the leagues of Hell,

through storms of soul devouring fire and shell.

For four long years I lived with filth and dung

that I might save her image and her spell.

And to what end was all the carnage wrought,

and for what peace the scarring battles fought?

How nearer are we now to Liberty?

At what price, what freedom have we bought?

 

The fickle jade’s eluded us once more

And fled the world by some unguarded door.

Despairing now, I contemplate defeat,

and yet, to follow her I am foreswore.

 

And though I know her artifice so well,

The hussy still has power to weave her spell,

and in the sacred name of Liberty

tomorrow I would walk gain through Hell.

 

                                    XIX

A-down the years, in turmoil, in seclusion,

I followed her, and to what end? Confusion.

The mocking wraith that men call Liberty

is but a siren’s snare, a fool’s delusion.

                             XX

And yet… and yet… One did find Liberty,

and not through Eden, but Gethsemane;

not over ocean, mountain top or plain,

but up a neighbouring hill, upon a tree.   

                     Horizons

A Man's horizons - that's what measures his size,

And not his physical weight or height or girth,

Nor even the gifts bestowed on him at birth.

He Must be tall in spirit who would rise

Above the ruck, and scan the distant skies.

Who sees but earth is blinded by the earth 

Where little men can only measure worth

By little rules and seek the little prize.

Be they high or low or great or small

A man's horizons mark his limitation.

His vision sets the limit of his goal.

He builds his own imposing prison wall

Of self or creed or city, race or nation,

World or universe  . . . or flesh or soul.

 

Dorothea Spears

                    Hours

To-day the hours are birds

And every bird sings

And flies across the skies of day

On shining silver wings

 

Perhaps all hours are things

Of beauty if we knew.

If we could see and hear and feel

Behind the grey the blue.

 

Perhaps the song is endless

And we but deaf and blind

Who will not look behind the clouds

To seek that we may find

          

Dorothea Spears

               House Finding

Does anyone buy a cottage just because

A stream runs through the garden, and the grass

Is kempt and green, and golden daffodils

And flaming tulips dare you not to pass…

Because primulas and hyacinths

Are gay against a grim and glowering day,

(Even the tempered wind goes tip-toe by)

And feathered fellows cry, “Stay! Stay!”

Because the orchard ambles up a hill

To where a bare elm points to property’s end

Above the weir that worked the vanished mill…

Or just because it greets you like a friend?

 

O, lift the latch lightly …whisper a prayer…

“Dear God, let the walls be sound, the roof and the stair!”

 

Avondster

Klein Constantia Rd, Constantia, Republic of SA

      How Arrogant is Man

How arrogant, how arrogant is Man,

The denizen of this dark planet, unbowed

As Lucifer; proud as Arachne, who span

Against the gods and won a spider’s shroud.

The possibility that there should be

Within this galaxy a greater Race

Of mightier mind and freer soul than he

Inhabiting the vastness of space

To little Man is unbelievable.

That evolution is older than the earth

To little man is inconceivable,

Whose life is limited by death and birth.

 

Why think that universe scarcely known

Exists, O little Man, for you alone?

How easily I Might Have Missed 

This Moment

Nothing in the rising of this sun

Could indicate that this particular moment

Lay in wait for me to come and claim it.

Nothing in the breaking of this dawn,

Although it heralded a shining day,

That seemed to say to me in any way

“Surprise! Surprise!” or bade me shut my eyes

Until I broke the wrapping of the hours

And came upon this moment: dawn revealed

No hint of what the day concealed. I might

Have missed it altogether, shattering thought,

And been the poorer all my life nor known,

However much I sought, what I had missed

This day, by turning left instead of right

Of hurrying towards the night too soon,

Too business-bound at noon to stop or look

Or listen – to this record or this book.

By chance, I thought, I chose these living poets

To speak their living words to me, to me:

And I arose and went with them to see

What they had seen and be for this brief space

Of time where they had been… and time stood still

And filled this moment with eternity.

 

Airlie Close

Constantia, C.P.

        How Far to Bethlehem

How far is it from Africa

To Bethlehem, on Christmas Day?

From Anywhere to Bethlehem

Is never very far away

On Christmas Day, they say, they say.

How far the shepherds and the Star:

How far the Manger and the Stall

From where the gold and diamonds are?

At Christmas time not far at all

And anyone may call, may call.

How far the Miracle, the Birth?

As near as love, as far as fear.

In every corner of the earth

When Christmas brings the time of year

Bethlehem is here, is here.

And hearts of men, wherever they be,

Can hear the heavenly choirs still

And share in this Nativity

Of peace on earth to men of goodwill

    How Independent is Man?

Strange that Man, the logical, conceives himself to be

An independent entity, a separate whole,

A different pattern with a disparate goal.

 

I sit within my house of flesh and bone

Dispassionately making an attempt to see

Within this edifice; this heart, this' mind, this soul,

A something that is separately, only, me.

But here are hosts of forbears, and environments that pause and pass,

Transcendent thoughts, and characteristics of race

And nation and family and place

 

I sit within my house of brick and thatch and stone

And wood, and everything I use and touch −

Books and clothes and music, silver, chair, glass −

Are come of other things and people. All are such.

How many minds and hearts and hands are part of this design,

The pattern of this life that I call mine?

       How Long the Sky Remembers

How long the sky remembers after the sun has set,

Cherishing the embers, unwilling to forget

The magic of that moment when sparks of day's desire

Were blown from hidden altars and set the sky on fire

That crept along the rays of cloud between day and night,

Till earth was a reflection of the flaming light

Where watchers warmed their hearts, till the flames died down at last.

But the warm glow lingered in the west long after the vast

Display was over, caught like a thought in a misty net.

And The sky remembered a long time after the sun was set.

 

Dorothea Spears

             Humanity Naked

Remove from men the clothes that camouflage them,

the businesses and badges, and the airs

Of wealth and poverty, the tags and titles –

And see how each uncovered ego fares

Without the kind cosmetics, flattering fashions.

Reflected by mirrors in the eyes,

The unprotected eyes of all their fellows,

Would they not all be shaken by surprise?

 

Airlie Close

Constantia C.P.

Humankind Cannot Bear Too Much Reality

There are moments when the beauty of the Word

Is too powerful, too poignant to be borne.

So pregnant with potential promise stirred

To quickened meaning that the being's torn

With joyful pain endeavouring to hear

So great a weight of wonder and desire,

When all the elements of earth and air

And water blend in syllables of fire.

Creation at such moments bares her breast

To all the children of her womb who dare

To face the unveiled and the unexpressed,

Imbibe the Love forever flowing there.

The moment passes and the glory wanes

The taste of immortality remains.

 

Dorothea Spears

                     Humility

                  (Except ye become)

We have forgotten the meaning of humility…

Humility is the recognition of a child that is he is a child

And that his elders are his elders, older and bigger and

Wiser than he

And more experienced in love and understanding

That asks for no obeisance, but only for return.

The unmarred child responds to kindness by putting his hand into the hand of the grown-up who is kind

Whether that grown-up be a queen or a sweeper of streets.

This is the true humility –

Not self-abasement, nor grovelling –

But the natural unconscious recognition of the child

For the adult.

Some of us are younger, some older…

But which of us are more than children in the Presence

of Omniscience?

            Hungry for Beauty

Hungry am I for beauty.

Surfeit cannot sate,

Repletion satisfy

nor glutting blunt the edge of my desire.

I am as unappeasable as Fate,

insatiable as fire.

I would lap up beauty as a tongue of flame

and send it forth again in such a blazing spire

of words as should illuminate the earth

and light men’s way to God,

quickening beauty to another birth

within the souls of men,

as sun revives new beauty from the sod

and from bare twigs brings forth the rose again.

 

Feed me with beauty: Gorge me with delight.

Pour out the sunset’s wine and let me drink

long, satisfying draughts, until I swoon

into the sable arms of night

and tremble with the stars upon the brink

of nothingness, before a silent moon.

Dazzle my eyes with the brilliant, new-born green

of young oak leaves uncurled

against a dappled sky in Spring:

blind me with the sheen

of frost-rimed spiders-web or lawn dew-pearled

at dawn, or on the underwing

of pigeons wheeling in the sun

like silver arrows stayed in flight.

 

Drench me with song of golden-throated bird,

laughter of waterfall, music of trees

wind-played, the purl of words,

the restless cadences of storm,

the mighty diapason of the seas.

Drape me with drifting cloud and like a bride

I’ll tread the azure aisles of heaven’s fane,

accompanied by eagles in their pride.

With winged feet I’ll run

To taste immortal pain

And join my lord, the sun.

 

Mount me upon the wild

unbroken stallions of the deep

And I will ride tempestuously where

the mountainous seas are piled:

exultant I will breast the ocean’s steep

and feel the tempest’s fingers in my hair.

 

Hungry am I for beauty.

Against the flaming gate

that bars the way to heaven’s forbidden portal

I beat, importunate

and potent with desire.

“Open!” I cry. “Open!”

and I will enter, fearless and elate

to meet my fate;

to perish in undying fire

or be immortal.

                    Hypothesis

Who knows what painful periods of transition

Preceded each new kingdom on this earth,

What sacrifices, destruction, crucifixion

To bring another kingdom into birth?

 

Is all complete? Is Man the consummation,

The ultimate result, the final goal,

The destined end, the summit of Creation?

Or move we toward a greater, higher whole?

 

Airlie Close

Constantia C.P.