Poem April 12, 1941 Issue

Immortality

ETHEL WASGATT DENNIS

They crucified him there; yea, not content
To mock his kingship with a crown of thorns,
With pain of cruel scourgings, and led on
By subtle priestcraft, jealous of its power,
They sought to put to death the Son of God.
He met the storm of their unreasoning hate
Without resentment, and his humble prayer
Breathes down the years to us, "Father, forgive."
This was the tender message all the way
That he had walked their midst alone with God,
And healed their sick, and fed each hungering heart,
Yea, cast out devils, and restored their dead.

They sealed his body in the sepulcher,
And posted round the door a Roman guard
In fear lest he might rise, as he had said.
The things that die are greed, and selfish pride,
The mad ambition of the carnal will.
These sink, at length, to their own nothingness,
And so are buried from the sight of men.
But he, whose every thought was filled with love,
Was thereby one with Life, and such an one
Had nothing to surrender unto death.
Love could not die, nor humble, steadfast faith
That looked beyond the troubled dreams of sense,
Beyond the shadow of the cross itself,
To keep man's glorious covenant with Life.

As tiny threadlike roots of tender plants
Will rend some giant mass of rock in twain,
So, each reflected quality of good,
However small it seems to mortal sight,
Destroys some phase of error; and 'twas thus
God raised him up, and "loosed the pains of death,"
For Truth cannot be holden of a lie.
Life called its own, and Life's idea obeyed;
And now, at last, the riven tomb made plain
What ignorance and hatred strove to hide,
That through this man's serene and blameless life,
His demonstration of the Truth, or Christ,
Came healing and deliverance to mankind,
The way whereby each humble heart may prove
The radiance of a life at' one with God.

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