Ralph Hodgson
Reading edition
THE MYSTERY
He came and took me by the hand
Up to a red rose tree,
He kept His meaning to Himself
But gave a rose to me.
I did not pray Him to lay bare
The mystery to me;
Enough the rose was Heaven to smell,
And His own face to see.
THREE POEMS
I
Babylon—where I go dreaming
When I weary of to-day,
Weary of a world grown gray.
134II
God loves an idle rainbow,
No less than laboring seas.
III
Reason has moons, but moons not hers
Lie mirrored on her sea,
Confounding her astronomers,
But, oh, delighting me!
STUPIDITY STREET
I saw with open eyes
Singing birds sweet
Sold in the shops
For the people to eat,
Sold in the shops of
Stupidity Street.
I saw in vision
The worm in the wheat,
And in the shops nothing
For people to eat;
Nothing for sale in
Stupidity Street.