A Voice in the Wilderness In Defense of "Mere Conservatism"

GK Day: Some Poetry From The Big Guy

Courtesy: A.E. Carnehl, Guest Contributor

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This poem by Gilbert Keith Chesterton is found in his superb book of poetry, The Ballad of St. Barbara, from 1922.

GK's entire personal philosophy was built around Christ and His Church, and he often said that he came to this divine realization through the "absurd wonder of reality."  For Chesterton, it was nothing short of absurdly wonderful that a man should have two arms and two legs, let alone a mind or a soul.  Creation and everything in it was beautifully crafted by God to point to His glory.

Enjoy this poem of his:

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Sunder me from my bones, O sword of God
Till they stand stark and strange as do the trees;
That I whose heart goes up with the soaring woods
May marvel as much at these.

Sunder me from my blood that in the dark
I hear that red ancestral river run
Like branching buried floods that find the sea
But never see the sun.

Give me miraculous eyes to see my eyes
Those rolling mirrors made alive in me
Terrible crystals more incredible
Than all the things they see

Sunder me from my soul, that I may see
The sins like streaming wounds, the life's brave beat
Till I shall save myself as I would save
A stranger in the street.