Named

When, saddened by our human plight

(We trust not God or men, from fear

Of death and time’s unravelling spool),

I stand, O Lord, beneath your night

And hear the grass and tired trees

Stirring in their sleep, I feel a fool

To fret that our inveterate sin,

Yielding such disloyalty, might shake

The structures of your faithfulness.

When lightning rends the dark, and din

Of thunder claps in cloud-quake

That makes the poor heart tremble,

The breadth of your great power, Lord,

Your sway and glory, strikes my soul;

Sin’s citadels encroaching on our race,

Issue of our disgrace, then cease to tower

In my mind, and fear, faith’s enemy,

Is toppled from its throne and trampled down.

Yet under the turn of constellations,

The Dippers, Taurus, the precious stars

That stud the White Way’s lustrous hoop,

What prompts my heart to adoration 

Is not the splendour of those heavenly flames,

Not night’s sweep nor the galaxy’s loop

In space, but wind in the dark leaves,

Breathing on the furrowed earth, breathing

On my furrowed brow, the still voice

In the breeze whispering under the eaves

Of the universe, calling the heart harrowed

By love’s impossibility, to rejoice.

Oh, not the call’s content but the fact 

Of it, first is wonderful – I am named!

And if named, then known, wanted, claimed.

The call itself – the Word – is the act.

Found – loved! – I stand enthralled

To hear on the night wind my name called.