The Temple
By Virna Sheard
Enter the temple beautiful! The house not made with hands!
Rain-washed and green, wind-swept and clean,
Beneath the blue it stands,
And no cathedral anywhere
Seemeth so holy or so fair.
It hath no heavy gabled roof, no door with lock and key,
No window-bars shut out the stars,
The aisles are wide and free -
Here through the night each altar-light
Is but a moon-beam, silver-white.
Silently as the temple grew at Solomon's command,
Still as things seem within a dream
This rose from out the land:
And all the pillars, grey and high,
Lifted their arches to the sky.
Here is the perfume of the leaves, the incense of the pines -
The magic scent that hath been pent
Within the tangled vines:
No censor filled with spices rare
E'er swung such sweetness on the air.
And all the golden gloom of it holdeth no haunting fear,
For it is blessed, and giveth rest
To those who enter here -
Here in the evening - who can know
But God Himself walks to and fro!
And music past all mastering within the chancel rings;
None could desire a sweeter choir
Than this - that soars and sings,
Till far the scented shadows creep -
And quiet darkness bringeth sleep.