| Nicholson & Lee, eds. The Oxford Book of English Mystical Verse. 1917. |
| |
| 313. The Holy of Holies |
| By Gilbert Keith Chesterton (b. 1874) |
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| ‘ELDER father, though thine eyes | |
| Shine with hoary mysteries, | |
| Canst thou tell what in the heart | |
| Of a cowslip blossom lies? | |
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| ‘Smaller than all lives that be, | 5 |
| Secret as the deepest sea, | |
| Stands a little house of seeds, | |
| Like an elfin’s granary. | |
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| ‘Speller of the stones and weeds, | |
| Skilled in Nature’s crafts and creeds, | 10 |
| Tell me what is in the heart | |
| Of the smallest of the seeds.’ | |
| |
| ‘God Almighty, and with Him | |
| Cherubim and Seraphim, | |
| Filling all eternity— | 15 |
| Adonai Elohim.’ | |
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