THE SEVENFOLD SACRAMENT
In eddies of obsidian
At my feet the river ran
Between me and the poppy-prankt
Isle, with tangled roots embanked,
Where seven sister poplars stood
Like the seven Spirits of God.
Soft as silence in mine ear,
The drone and rustle of the weir
Told in bass the treble tale
Of the embowered nightingale.
Higher, on the patient river,
Velvet lights without a quiver
Echoed through their hushéd rimes
The garden’s glow beneath the limes.
Then the sombre village, crowned
By the castellated ground
Where, in cerements of sable,
One square tower and one great gable
Stood, the melancholy wraith
Of a false and fallen faith.
Over all, supine, enthralling,
The young moon, her faint edge falling
To the dead verge of her setting,
Saintly swam, her silver fretting
All the leaves with light. Afar
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