Bernard Patrick O'Dowd

Love and Sacrifice

CAN we not consecrate
To man and God above 
This volume of our great 
Supernal tide of love? 

’Twere wrong its wealth to waste 
On merely me and you, 
In selfish touch and taste, 
As other lovers do. 

This love is not as theirs: 
It came from the Divine, 
Whose glory still it wears, 
And print of Whose design. 

The world is full of woe,
The time is blurred with dust, 
Illusions breed and grow, 
And eyes’ and flesh’s lust.

The mighty league with Wrong 
And stint the weakling’s bread; 
The very lords of song 
With Luxury have wed. 

Fair Art deserts the mass, 
And loiters with the gay; 
And only gods of brass 
Are popular to-day. 

Two souls with love inspired, 
Such lightning love as ours, 
Could spread, if we desired, 
Dismay among such powers: 

Could social stables purge 
Of filth where festers strife: 
Through modern baseness surge 
A holier tide of life.

Yea, two so steeped in love 
From such a source, could draw 
The angels from above 
To lead all to their Law. 

We have no right to seek 
Repose in rosy bower, 
When Hunger thins the cheek 
Of childhood every hour:

Nor while the tiger, Sin, 
’Mid youths and maidens roams, 
Should Duty skulk within 
These selfish cosy homes. 

Our place is in the van 
With those crusaders, who 
Maintain the rights of man 
’Gainst despot and his crew. 

If sacrifice may move 
Their load of pain from men, 
The greatest right of Love 
Is to renounce It then. 

Ah, Love, the earth is woe’s 
And sadly helpers needs: 
And, till its burden goes,
Our work is—where it bleeds.