Classic Poem

I will open my heart to Love and we will glean
The fields together;
Garnering a good harvest.
He shall gather the nations of the world as blossoms
And weave them into a crown,
As little children braid corn-flowers for their curls,
And twine dandelions, with laughter;
As maidens gather roses
Which because of their sweet odor
They place in their bosoms,
Leaving blood upon the thorns.

My soul thrills, even as I think the laburnum
Thrills with April sap, longing to link
Her chain of gold in the love universal.
I am glad with robins which unrestrained
By any law but love
Build homes in the maples, where in secret
They brood life mysteriously out of blue eggs.
And with swallows which, for love's sake, nest under the eaves.
Their houses are frail things,
But the foundations are laid on love.
I rejoice in the hills which draw their veils
About them like brides; seeking the cloister.
I perceive the grey and drifting sky freely enfolding them
As women enfold strong men for love.
My heart rejoices in the soft unfurling of leaves
After the blossoms have proclaimed their message
" Beauty and fragrance and heavy hanging fruit
" Sweet to taste, with the seeds of life within them,
" Are but one adoration of Love Eternal;
" Moving freely in the unalterable cycle. "

Resolve the sprouting of a grain of wheat,
Or the unwrapping of the oak's young leaves;
The poppy-seeds' insistent reproduction of poppies;
Make but one poppy-seed — yea, but one poppy-seed
Which shall sprout and grow into the diaphanous scarlet chalice,
Then may you say unto your brother,
" I will mould you by force.
" By my will I will model you.
" This for you shall be right
" And this for you shall be wrong.
" I will compel you to my own image.
" By the lash I will make you to be as I,
" In my infinite wisdom, wish you to be. "
O, who can make a seed of grass, or a bud,
Which with secret alchemy of sun and rain
Shall expand and flower
And bear its proper fruit in its own season?

Man cannot make even a poppy seed,
But it is childish-easy to destroy.
And who can fashion a soul?
But it is easy to destroy a soul;
It is the very pastime of Civilization.
Christian civilization.
Man is himself but a plant —
Growing by the same inexorable,
Universal law of Freedom,
But he invades the garden with the sharp
Ploughshare of ignorance and intolerance destroying all beauty.