Easter Sunday, 1916

The sun shone white and fair,
This Eastertide,
Yet all its sweetness seemed but to deride
Our souls' despair;
For stricken hearts, and loss and pain,
Were everywhere.
We sang our Alleluias,--
We said, "The Christ is risen!
                From this His earthly prison,
                The Christ indeed is risen.
                He is gone up on high,
                To the perfect peace of heaven."

Then, with a sigh,
We wondered...
Our minds evolved grim hordes of huns,
Our bruised hearts sank beneath the guns,
On our very souls they thundered.
Can you wonder?--Can you wonder,
That we wondered,
As we heard the huns' guns thunder?
That we looked in one another's eyes
And wondered,--

"Is Christ indeed then risen from the dead?
Hath He not rather fled
For ever from a world where He
Meets such contumely?"

Our hearts were sick with pain,
As they beat the sad refrain,--
"How shall the Lord Christ come again?
How can the Lord Christ come again?
Nay,--will He come again?
Is He not surely fled
For ever from a world where He
Is still so buffeted?"

But the day's glory all forbade
Such depth of woe.    Came to our aid
The sun, the birds, the springing things,
The winging things, the singing things;
And taught us this,--
After each Winter cometh Spring,--
God's hand is still in everything,--
His mighty purposes are sure,--
His endless love doth still endure,
And will not cease, nor know remiss,
Despite man's forfeiture.

The Lord is risen indeed!
In very truth and deed
The Lord is risen, is risen, is risen;
He will supply our need.

So we took heart again,
And built us refuges from pain
Within His coverture,--
Strong towers of Love, and Hope, and Faith,
That shall maintain
Our souls' estate
Too high and great
For even Death to violate.

William Arthur Dunkerley (John Oxenham)

William Arthur Dunkerley, better known by his pen name John Oxenham, was an English journalist, novelist, and poet. He was a prolific writer in the early 20th century, producing a wide range of literary works including poetry, hymns, and novels. His works often reflected Christian themes and were popular during his time. Dunkerley also contributed to the establishment of the Boys' Brigade, a notable youth organization in the UK. His legacy includes a significant contribution to both literature and social causes.

William Arthur Dunkerley (John Oxenham)

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William Arthur Dunkerley (John Oxenham), Simple Poetry

Giant Circumstance

William Arthur Dunkerley (John Oxenham), Simple Poetry

Macedonia, 1903

William Arthur Dunkerley (John Oxenham), Simple Poetry

Quo Vadis?

William Arthur Dunkerley (John Oxenham), Simple Poetry

English

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Easter Day II

So in the sinful streets, abstracted and alone,
I with my secret self held communing of mine own.
So in the southern city spake the tongue
Of one that somewhat overwildly sung,
But in a later hour I sat and heard
Another voice that spake another graver word.
Weep not, it bade, whatever hath been said,
Though He be dead, He is not dead.
In the true creed
He is yet risen indeed;
Christ is yet risen.

Weep not beside His tomb,
Ye women unto whom
He was great comfort and yet greater grief;
Nor ye, ye faithful few that wont with Him to roam,
Seek sadly what for Him ye left, go hopeless to your home;
Nor ye despair, ye sharers yet to be of their belief;
Though He be dead, He is not dead,
Nor gone, though fled,
Not lost, though vanished;
Thou...

Arthur Hugh Clough

Easter.

When dawns on earth the Easter sun
The dear saints feel an answering thrill.
With whitest flowers their hands they fill;
And, singing all in unison,

Unto the battlements they press--
The very marge of heaven--how near!
And bend, and look upon us here
With eyes that rain down tenderness.

Their roses, brimmed with fragrant dew,
Their lilies fair they raise on high;
"Rejoice! The Lord is risen!" they cry;
"Christ is arisen; we prove it true!

"Rejoice, and dry those faithless tears
With which your Easter flowers are stained;
Share in our bliss, who have attained
The rapture of the eternal years;

"Have proved the promise which endures,
The Love that deigned, the Love that died;
Have reached our haven by His side--
Are Christ's...

Susan Coolidge

An Easter Hymn

Spake the Lord Christ - "I will arise."
    It seemed a saying void and vain -
    How shall a dead man rise again! -
Vain as our tears, vain as our cries.
    Not one of all the little band
    That loved Him this might understand.

"I will arise" - Lord Jesus said.
    Hearken, amid the morning dew,
    Mary, a voice that calleth you, -
Then Mary turned her golden head,
    And lo! all shining at her side
    Her Master they had crucified.

At dawn to his dim sepulchre,
    Mary, remembering that far day,
    When at his feet the spikenard lay,
Came, bringing balm and spice and myrrh;
    To her the grave had made reply:
    "He is not here - He cannot die."

Praetor and priest in vain conspire,
    Jerusalem and Rome in vain

Richard Le Gallienne

Easter Day

Naples, 1849


Through the great sinful streets of Naples as I past,
With fiercer heat than flamed above my head
My heart was hot within me; till at last
My brain was lightened, when my tongue had said
Christ is not risen!

Christ is not risen, no,
He lies and moulders low;
Christ is not risen.

What though the stone were rolled away, and though
The grave found empty there?
If not there, then elsewhere;
If not where Joseph laid Him first, why then
Where other men
Translaid Him after; in some humbler clay
Long ere to-day
Corruption that sad perfect work hath done,
Which here she scarcely, lightly had begun.
The foul engendered worm
Feeds on the flesh of the life-giving form
Of our most Holy and Anointed One.
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Arthur Hugh Clough

Easter Bells

Oh bells of Easter morn, oh solemn sounding bells,
    Which fill the hollow cells
Of the blue April air with a most sweet refrain,
    Ye fill my heart with pain.

For when, as from a thousand holy altar-fires,
    A thousand resonant spires
Sent up the offering--the glad thanksgiving strain--
    "The Lord is risen again!"

He went from us who shall return no more, no more!
    I say the sad words o'er,
And they are mixed and blent with your triumphant psalm,
    Like bitterness and balm,

We stood with him beside the black and silent river,
    Cold, cold and soundless ever;
But there our feet were stayed--unloosed our clasping fond,
    And he has passed beyond.

And still that solemn hymn, like smoke of sacrifice,
    Clomb the bl...

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Easter Even

(Lyra Messianica, 1864.)


There is nothing more that they can do
    For all their rage and boast;
Caiaphas with his blaspheming crew,
    Herod with his host,

Pontius Pilate in his Judgement-hall
    Judging their Judge and his,
Or he who led them all and passed them all,
    Arch-Judas with his kiss.

The sepulchre made sure with ponderous Stone,
    Seal that same stone, O Priest;
It may be thou shalt block the holy One
    From rising in the east:

Set a watch about the sepulchre
    To watch on pain of death;
They must hold fast the stone if One should stir
    And shake it from beneath.

God Almighty, He can break a seal
    And roll away a Stone,
Can grind the proud in dust who would not kneel,
...

Christina Georgina Rossetti