To One Consecrated

Your paths were all unknown to us:
We were so far away from you,
We mixed in thought your spirit thus--
With whiteness, stars of gold, and dew.

The mighty mother nourished you:
Her breath blew from her mystic bowers:
Their elfin glimmer floated through
The pureness of your shadowy hours.

The mighty mother made you wise;
Gave love that clears the hidden ways:
Her glooms were glory to your eyes;
Her darkness but the Fount of Days.

She made all gentleness in you,
And beauty radiant as the morn's:
She made our joy in yours, then threw
Upon your head a crown of thorns.

Your eyes are filled with tender light,
For those whose eyes are dim with tears;
They see your brow is crowned and bright,
But not its ring of wounding spears.

George William Russell

George William Russell, who wrote under the pseudonym 'AE,' was an Irish writer, editor, critic, poet, and painter. As a prominent mystical writer, he contributed significantly to the Irish Literary Revival. He also played a vital role in the cooperative movement in Ireland and was a close associate of notable literary figures like W.B. Yeats.

George William Russell

Rest

George William Russell, Simple Poetry

Prologue: The Nuts of Knowledge

George William Russell, Simple Poetry

Song

George William Russell, Simple Poetry

The Twilight Of Earth

George William Russell, Simple Poetry

English

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Reconciliation

I begin through the grass once again to be bound to the Lord;
I can see, through a face that has faded, the face full of rest
Of the Earth, of the Mother, my heart with her heart in accord:
As I lie mid the cool green tresses that mantle her breast
I begin with the grass once again to be bound to the Lord.

By the hand of a child I am led to the throne of the King,
For a touch that now fevers me not is forgotten and far,
And His infinite sceptred hands that sway us can bring
Me in dreams from the laugh of a child to the song of a star.
On the laugh of a child I am borne to the joy of the King.

Well, when all is said and done
Best within my narrow way,
May some angel of the sun
Muse memorial o'er my clay:

'Here was beauty all betrayed
From the freed...

George William Russell

The Breath of Light

From the cool and dark-lipped furrows
    breathes a dim delight
Aureoles of joy encircle
    every blade of grass
Where the dew-fed creatures silent
    and enraptured pass:
And the restless ploughman pauses,
    turns, and wondering
Deep beneath his rustic habit
    finds himself a king;
For a fiery moment looking
    with the eyes of God
Over fields a slave at morning
    bowed him to the sod.
Blind and dense with revelation
    every moment flies,
And unto the Mighty Mother
    gay, eternal, rise
All the hopes we hold, the gladness,
    dreams of things to be.
One of all they generations,
    Mother, hails to thee!
Hail! and hail! and hail for ever:
    though I turn again
For they joy unto the human
    vesture...

George William Russell

The Man To The Angel

I have wept a million tears:
Pure and proud one, where are thine,
What the gain though all thy years
In unbroken beauty shine?

All your beauty cannot win
Truth we learn in pain and sighs:
You can never enter in
To the circle of the wise.

They are but the slaves of light
Who have never known the gloom,
And between the dark and bright
Willed in freedom their own doom.

Think not in your pureness there,
That our pain but follows sin:
There are fires for those who dare
Seek the throne of might to win.

Pure one, from your pride refrain:
Dark and lost amid the strife
I am myriad years of pain
Nearer to the fount of life.

When defiance fierce is thrown
At the God to whom you bow,
Rest the lips of the Unknown<...

George William Russell

The Earth Breath

From the cool and dark-lipped furrow breathes a dim delight
Through the woodland's purple plumage to the diamond night.
Aureoles of joy encircle every blade of grass
Where the dew-fed creatures silent and enraptured pass.
And the restless ploughman pauses, turns, and wondering,
Deep beneath his rustic habit finds himself a king;
For a fiery moment looking with the eyes of God
Over fields a slave at morning bowed him to the sod.
Blind and dense with revelation every moment flies.
And unto the mighty mother, gay, eternal, rise
All the hopes we hold, the gladness, dreams of things to be.
One of all thy generations, mother, hails to thee.
Hail, and hail, and hail for ever, though I turn again
From thy joy unto the human vestiture of pain.
I, thy child who went forth radiant...

George William Russell

The Virgin Mother

Who is that goddess to whom men should pray
But her from whom their hearts have turned away,
Out of whose virgin being they were born,
Whose mother nature they have named in scorn
Calling its holy substance common clay.

Yet from this so despised earth was made
The milky whiteness of those queens who swayed
Their generations with a light caress,
And from some image of whose loveliness
The heart built up high heaven when it prayed.

Lover, your heart, the heart on which it lies,
Your eyes that gaze, and those alluring eyes,
Your lips, the lips they kiss, alike had birth
Within this dark divinity of earth,
Within this mother being you despise.

Ah, when I think this earth on which we tread
Hath borne these blossoms of the lovely dead,
And mad...

George William Russell

To Isabel

A Beautiful Little Girl.

Fair as some sea-child, in her coral bower,
    Decked with the rare, rich treasures of the deep;
Mild as the spirit of the dream whose power
    Bears back the infant's soul to heaven, in sleep
Brightens the hues of summer's first-born flower
    Pure as the tears repentant mourners weep
O'er deeds to which the siren, Sin, beguiled, -
Art thou, sweet, smiling, bright-eyed cherub child.

Thy presence is a spell of holiness,
    From which unhallowed thoughts shrink blushing back, -
Thy smile is a warm light that shines to bless,
    As beams the beacon o'er the wanderer's track, -
Thy voice is music, at whose sounds Distress
    Unbinds her writhing victim from the rack
Of misery, and charmed by what she hears,
Forgets her w...

George W. Sands