Communion Poem by John Bannister Tabb

ONCE when my heart was passion-free
To learn of things divine,
The soul of nature suddenly
Outpoured itself in mine.

I held the secrets of the deep,
And of the heavens above;
I knew the harmonies of sleep,
The mysteries of love.

And for a moment’s interval
The earth, the sky, the sea—
My soul encompassed, each and all,
As now they compass me.

To one in all, to all in one—
Since Love the work began—
Life’s ever widening circles run,
Revealing God and man.