Were I A Skilful Painter / George MacDonald

Were I a skilful painter,

My pencil, not my pen,

Should try to teach thee hope and fear;

And who should blame me then?

Fear of the tide-like darkness

That followeth close behind,

And hope to make thee journey on

In the journey of the mind.

To My Sister / George MacDonald

O sister, God is very good--

Thou art a woman now:

O sister, be thy womanhood

A baptism on thy brow!

For what?--Do ancient stories lie

Of Titans long ago,

The children of the lofty sky

And mother earth below?

To My Father / George MacDonald

I.

Take of the first fruits, Father, of thy care,

Wrapped in the fresh leaves of my gratitude

Late waked for early gifts ill understood;

Claiming in all my harvests rightful share,

Whether with song that mounts the joyful air

I praise my God; or, in yet deeper mood,

Sit dumb because I know a speechless good,

Needing no voice, but all the soul for prayer.

To Aurelio Saffi / George MacDonald

To God and man be simply true:

Do as thou hast been wont to do:

Or, Of the old more in the new:

Mean all the same when said to you.

I love thee. Thou art calm and strong;

Firm in the right, mild to the wrong;

Thy heart, in every raging throng,

A chamber shut for prayer and song.

To A.J. Scott / George MacDonald

I walked all night: the darkness did not yield.

Around me fell a mist, a weary rain,

Enduring long; till a faint dawn revealed

A temple's front, cloud-curtained on the plain.

Closed were the lofty doors that led within;

But by a wicket one might entrance gain.

The Women Who Ministered Unto Him / George MacDonald

They give Him freely all they can,

They give Him clothes and food;

In this rejoicing, that the Man

Is not ashamed they should.

Enough He labours for his hire;

Yea, nought can pay his pain;

The sole return He doth require

Is strength to toil again.

The Woman Whom Satan Had Bound / George MacDonald

For eighteen years, O patient soul,

Thine eyes have sought thy grave;

Thou seest not thy other goal,

Nor who is nigh to save.

Thou nearest gentle words that wake

Thy long-forgotten strength;

Thou feelest tender hands that break

The iron bonds at length.

The Woman Who Came Behind Him in the Crowd / George MacDonald

Near him she stole, rank after rank;

She feared approach too loud;

She touched his garment's hem, and shrank

Back in the sheltering crowd.

A trembling joy goes through her frame:

Her twelve years' fainting prayer

Is heard at last; she is the same

As other women there.

The Woman That Was A Sinner / George MacDonald

She washes them with sorrow sweet,

She wipes them with her hair;

Her kisses soothe the weary feet,

To all her kisses bare.

The best of woman, beauty's crown,

She spends upon his feet;

Her eyes, her lips, her hair, flung down,

In one devotion meet.

The Woman That Cried in the Crowd / George MacDonald

She says within: "It is a man,

A man of mother born;

She is a woman--I am one,

Alive this holy morn."

Filled with his words that flow in light,

Her heart will break or cry:

A woman's cry bursts forth in might

Of loving agony.

The Woman of Samaria / George MacDonald

The empty pitcher to the pool

She bore in listless mood:

In haste she turned; the pitcher full

Beside the water stood.

To her was heard the age's prayer:

He sat upon the brink;

Weary beside the waters fair,

And yet He could not drink.

The Woman in the Temple / George MacDonald

A still dark joy. A sudden face,

Cold daylight, footsteps, cries;

The temple's naked, shining space,

Aglare with judging eyes.

With all thy wild abandoned hair,

And terror-pallid lips,

Thy blame unclouded to the air,

Thy honour in eclipse;

The Widow With the Two Mites / George MacDonald

Here much and little change their name

With changing need and time;

But more and less new judgments claim,

Where all things are sublime.

Sickness may be more hale than health,

And service kingdom high;

Yea, poverty be bounty's wealth,

To give like God thereby.

The Widow of Nain / George MacDonald

Away from living man's abode

The tides of sorrow sweep,

Bearing a dead man on the road

To where the weary sleep.

And down the hill, in sunny state,

Glad footsteps troop along;

A noble figure walks sedate,

The centre of the throng.

The Tree's Prayer / George MacDonald

Alas! 'tis cold and dark;

The wind all night has sung a wintry tune;

Hail from black clouds that swallowed up the moon

Has beat against my bark.

Oh! when will it be spring?

The sap moves not within my withered veins;

Through all my frozen roots creep numbing pains,

That they can hardly cling.

The Thank Offering / George MacDonald

My little child receives my gift,

A simple piece of bread;

But to her mouth she doth not lift

The love in bread conveyed,

Till on my lips, unerring, swift,

The morsel first is laid.

This is her grace before her food,

This her libation poured;

Uplift, like offering Aaron good

Heaved up unto the Lord;

More riches in the thanks than could

A thousand gifts afford!

The Syrophenician Woman / George MacDonald

"Bestow her prayer, and let her go;

She crieth after us."

Nay, to the dogs ye cast it so;

Help not a woman thus.

Their pride, by condescension fed,

He speaks with truer tongue:

"It is not meet the children's bread

Should to the dogs be flung."

The Mother of Zebedee's Children / George MacDonald

Ah mother! for thy children bold,

But doubtful of thy quest,

Thou begg'st a boon ere it be told,

Avoiding wisdom's test.

Though love is strong to bring thee nigh,

Ambition makes thee doubt;

Ambition dulls the prophet-eye;

It casts the unseen out.

The Mother Mary / George MacDonald

1.

Mary, to thee the heart was given

For infant hand to hold,

Thus clasping, an eternal heaven,

The great earth in its fold.

He seized the world with tender might,

By making thee his own;

Thee, lowly queen, whose heavenly height

Was to thyself unknown.

The Man of Songs / George MacDonald

"Thou wanderest in the land of dreams,

O man of many songs;

To thee the actual only seems--

No realm to thee belongs."

"Seest thou those mountains in the east,

O man of ready aim?"

"'T is only vapours that thou seest,

In mountain form and name."