Winter: Friday Morning Poem by John Bowring

Like a priestess from her temple's shade,
In her holiest robes of light array'd,
The morn walks forth;-day's glorious star
Towers o'er the misty mountains far;
The heavens are bright with celestial blue,
The earth is sprinkled o'er with dew,
And all is bright and gay and fair;
The spirit of joy and love is there-
Fit temple for that Glorious One,
Who form'd the earth and woke the sun.


If any soul of harmony
Is waken'd in humanity,
Thine is the music, Father! Thine
The morning minstrels' song divine.
Thou first didst string devotion's lyre;
Thine is the daylight's holy fire,
Thine is the evening's twilight ray,
And Thine the veil that shades the day.
Above yon arch sublime of heaven,
Is Thine eternal chariot driven;
Above the visible stars Thou reignest,
Yet sometimes in Thy mercy deignest
To bless the world with beams of light,
Reflected from Thy presence bright.


Bow Thee down to this lowliest sphere,
Thou, whose wisdom never can err;
Thou, whose power no limit boundeth;
Thou, whose love all space surroundeth!
If Thou wilt speak, there are thunders near Thee;
Millions of ministering spirits hear Thee,
Ever on the wing to obey;-
Eternal splendour lights Thy way,
Thy footsteps imprint the morning hills,
Thy voice is heard in the music of rills,
In the song of birds, and the heavenly chorus
That nature utters around us, o'er us.
Dead is the sense, and dull the ear,
That cannot perceive Thee every where;
Every where-and in every thing;
The motion in the insect's wing,
As the unmeasured comet's march,
Rolling sublime in yon boundless arch;
Beautiful in a drop of dew
As in the rainbow's glorious hue;
In the light zephyrs audible
As in the storm-wave's loudest swell;
In every thing Thy glory beameth-
From every thing Thy witness streameth;
Silence itself hath a voice for Thee,
In the thick darkness Thy light we see;
Even the cold grave, dreary and damp,
Is illumed by Thine eternal lamp.


Calmly on! the grave's dormitory
Hath its sweet visions of hope and glory;
Heaven shall cheer its stillness deep,
Heaven shall watch its holy sleep;
O'er it a brighter sun shall rise
Than ever lighted the visible skies.