Sword-pierced Mary, ponder well,
beneath the wide and wailing wall
of all this world, the prophet-word.
Death stalks the home and life
is shattered short; no laugh
leaps up, no joyful word.
God destroys, no pity gives;
the dead all mutter in their graves,
gnawed by winding worm.
No respite raised, no repose,
amid the pain no balmy peace
leaves vestige in this world.
Molten heart like wax moves down;
Shame and guilt, what have we done
against the good to war!
Shall human hearts, though vulgar, crass,
die blood-and-water on this cross
and, buried, feed the worms?
Pietà with pity's grief
processes to the silent grave,
itself without a word.
The stone is rolled and in this shade
it covers all; the tomb it shuts
and leaves us here without the Word.
But this was known. This evil way
will stay as evil as it was
but never have the final word.
For good may overcome and good
of newer kind is formed by God
to overtop and crown the world.
Comfort here? None shall you find
but comfort is not always friend
when darker things still wage their war.
Who sleeps in calm no vigil keeps
against the shadow-shade that creeps
across a heedless world.
For comfort there will come a time;
until then your own passions tame
while waiting for new word.
Sword-pierced Mary, ponder well,
beneath the wide and wailing wall
of all this world, the prophet-word.
