I see You with the face they paint

I see You with the face they paint For some saint Born and saved in some sublime Olden time, Crowned with the gorgeous golden-waved Aureole; Just such a saint as should have saved My own soul.

Yes; for you have the human grace In your face Painted upon the panel there, And what hair! ‘Fra’—who was he? I forget— Who could paint Such a woman wholly, and yet Such a saint?

From the dim cathedral height Falls the light; I could think it for a while Christ’s smile From the great window-scene above Strangely shed Toward you, resting like Christ’s love On your head.

O the splendid purple niche Deep and rich, Stained of the colour of your soul Strong and whole, Full of the prevalence of prayers And piteous plaint You made for men and sins all theirs —You a saint!

The niche a little narrow: well, As the cell Your world, your body—all things seen— Must have been About the soul that day by day Groped and felt To God’s own house and found the way As you knelt:

In an attitude of prayer O how fair! All the body crouched, constrained As if pained With the spirit’s inward groan To entreat For a sin you could not own, O how sweet!

Hands God making must have praised; Clasped and raised Holy mediæval way Used to pray; Sky all wrapped about your head Blue and sweet, Earth all golden from the tread Of your feet.

God, who of all this world of ours Gathers flowers, Gathered you in the old sublime Flower time: If God had left some flowers like you— Who can tell?— He might have had yet one or two Flowers that fell.

O then there were great sins of course; Men were worse Some ways no doubt; at any rate Men were great: We cannot bear their mail, much less Lose or win Their heavens, through their great holiness Or great sin.

There were high things for men to see, Do, or be; Fair struggles after every throne: And to atone Fair crowns and kingdoms for the best; All men strove, And, loss or gain, for each man’s rest There was love.

And men and women bore their part Heart to heart, For oh! the women and the men Loved then; And love from love you could not break, Half to save; If one sinned, for the other’s sake God forgave.

Would thou wert yet, thou great and old Time of gold! Wert thou with me, or could I flee Back to thee, God might have had one other flower Nigh to fall, And I known love at least one hour —Once for all.

O who shall have the barren years? Who the tears? One with false bosom and cold kiss May have this: But somewhere, unless love forget His old way, There shall be something better yet —Ay, some day.