! ! The Searchlight Poem by Michael Shepherd

How George Herbert would have loved this word
for all the images it lights in mind!

The gloried sun of soul, no added light
needs, in unshadowed light of reason’s day;

but in the murky night of ignorance –
then reason’s other task, the probing beam
upon the dark, cruel cobweb-cornered mind
may shine; and as it clears the willing mind,
the sharper (and more seeming painful) those
last vestiges of age-old, flying things
that lurk and creep in coward-cov’ring dark!

A stormy sea needs most a light-house brave:
for age-old things resent the searchlight’s beam;
but when the night, and that unknowing’s cloud
yield to the eastward flush of dawn – how bright
the daylight shines, for those who watch all night!

And so, George Herbert, as you spoke the word -
in all things seen; for Whom, all done: our Lord.