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Home  »  Modern American Poetry  »  The Monk in the Kitchen

Louis Untermeyer, ed. (1885–1977). Modern American Poetry. 1919.

Anna Hempstead Branch1875–1937

The Monk in the Kitchen

I

ORDER is a lovely thing;

On disarray it lays its wing,

Teaching simplicity to sing.

It has a meek and lowly grace,

Quiet as a nun’s face.

Lo—I will have thee in this place!

Tranquil well of deep delight,

All things that shine through thee appear

As stones through water, sweetly clear.

Thou clarity,

That with angelic charity

Revealest beauty where thou art,

Spread thyself like a clean pool.

Then all the things that in thee are,

Shall seem more spiritual and fair,

Reflection from serener air—

Sunken shapes of many a star

In the high heavens set afar.

II

Ye stolid, homely, visible things,

Above you all brood glorious wings

Of your deep entities, set high,

Like slow moons in a hidden sky.

But you, their likenesses, are spent

Upon another element.

Truly ye are but seemings—

The shadowy cast-oft gleamings

Of bright solidities. Ye seem

Soft as water, vague as dream;

Image, cast in a shifting stream.

III

What are ye?

I know not.

Brazen pan and iron pot,

Yellow brick and gray flag-stone

That my feet have trod upon—

Ye seem to me

Vessels of bright mystery.

For ye do bear a shape, and so

Though ye were made by man, I know

An inner Spirit also made,

And ye his breathings have obeyed.

IV

Shape, the strong and awful Spirit,

Laid his ancient hand on you.

He waste chaos doth inherit;

He can alter and subdue.

Verily, he doth lift up

Matter, like a sacred cup.

Into deep substance he reached, and lo

Where ye were not, ye were; and so

Out of useless nothing, ye

Groaned and laughed and came to be.

And I use you, as I can,

Wonderful uses, made for man,

Iron pot and brazen pan.

V

What are ye?

I know not;

Nor what I really do

When I move and govern you.

There is no small work unto God.

He required of us greatness;

Of his least creature

A high angelic nature,

Stature superb and bright completeness.

He sets to us no humble duty.

Each act that he would have us do

Is haloed round with strangest beauty;

Terrific deeds and cosmic tasks

Of his plainest child he asks.

When I polish the brazen pan

I hear a creature laugh afar

In the gardens of a star,

And from his burning presence run

Flaming wheels of many a sun.

Whoever makes a thing more bright,

He is an angel of all light.

When I cleanse this earthen floor

My spirit leaps to see

Bright garments trailing over it,

A cleanness made by me.

Purger of all men’s thoughts and ways,

With labor do I sound Thy praise,

My work is done for Thee.

Whoever makes a thing more bright,

He is an angel of all light.

Therefore let me spread abroad

The beautiful cleanness of my God.

VI

One time in the cool of dawn

Angels came and worked with me.

The air was soft with many a wing.

They laughed amid my solitude

And cast bright looks on everything.

Sweetly of me did they ask

That they might do my common task

And all were beautiful—but one

With garments whiter than the sun

Had such a face

Of deep, remembered grace;

That when I saw I cried—“Thou art

The great Blood-Brother of my heart.

Where have I seen thee?”—And he said,

 100How often thou art there.

“When we are dancing round God’s throne,

Beauties from thy hands have flown

Like white doves wheeling in mid air.

Nay—thy soul remembers not?

 105

VII

What are we? I know not.

Work on, and cleanse thy iron pot.”