{"id":628,"date":"2011-06-26T16:56:23","date_gmt":"2011-06-26T16:56:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/?p=628"},"modified":"2012-04-29T11:46:16","modified_gmt":"2012-04-29T11:46:16","slug":"morwennae-statio","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/?p=628","title":{"rendered":"‘Morwennae Statio’"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

MORWENNAE STATIO<\/strong><\/p>\n

My Saxon shrine! the only ground
\nWherein this weary heart hath rest:
\nWhat years the birds of God have found
\nAlong thy walls their sacred nest!
\nThe storm — the blast — the tempest shock,
\nHave beat upon these walls in vain;
\nShe stands — a daughter of the rock —
\nThe changeless God’s eternal fane.<\/p>\n

Firm was their faith, the ancient bands,
\nThe wise of heart in wood and stone;
\nWho reared, with stern and trusting hands,
\nThese dark grey towers of days unknown:
\nThey fill’d these aisles with many a thought,
\nThey bade each nook some truth reveal:
\nThe pillar’d arch its legends brought,
\nA doctrine came with roof and wall.<\/p>\n

Huge, mighty, massive, hard, and strong,
\nWere the choice stones they lifted then:
\nThe vision of their hope was long,
\nThey knew their God those faithful men.
\nThey pitched no tent for change or death,
\nNo home to last man’s shadowy day;
\nThere! there! the everlasting breath,
\nWould breathe whole centuries away.<\/p>\n

See now along that pillar’d aisle,
\nThe graven arches, firm and fair:
\nThey bend their shoulders to the toil,
\nAnd lift the hollow roof in air.
\nA sign! beneath the ship we stand,
\nThe inverted vessel’s arching side;
\nForsaken — when the fisher-band
\nWent forth to sweep a mightier tide.<\/p>\n

Pace we the ground! our footsteps tread
\nA cross — the builder’s holiest form:
\nThat awful couch, where once was shed
\nThe blood, with man’s forgiveness warm.
\nAnd here, just where His mighty breast
\nThrob’d the last agony away,
\nThey bade the voice of worship rest,
\nAnd white-robed Levites pause and pray.<\/p>\n

Mark! the rich rose of Sharon’s bowers
\nCurves in the paten’s mystic mould:
\nThe lily, lady of the flowers,
\nHer shape must yonder chalice hold.
\nTypes of the Mother and the Son,
\nThe twain in this dim chapel stand:
\nThe badge of Norman banners, one
\nAnd one a crest of English land.<\/p>\n

How all things glow with life and thought,
\nWhere’er our faithful fathers trod!
\nThe very ground with speech is fraught,
\nThe air is eloquent of God.
\nIn vain would doubt or mockery hide
\nThe buried echoes of the past;
\nA voice of strength, a voice of pride,
\nHere dwells amid the storm and blast.<\/p>\n

Still points the tower and pleads the bell;
\nThe solemn arches breathe in stone;
\nWindow and wall have lips to tell
\nThe mighty faith of days unknown.
\nYea! flood and breeze, and battle shock
\nShall beat upon this church in vain:
\nShe stands, a daughter of the rock,
\nThe changeless God’s eternal fane.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

*\u00a0 *\u00a0 *\u00a0 *\u00a0 *<\/p>\n

From Cornish Ballads and Other Poems, <\/em>by R. S. Hawker, ed. by C. E, Byles, p. 49.\u00a0 This poem was first published in Ecclesia<\/em>, 1840.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Photo \u00a9 Angela Williams 2010<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A poem by Robert Stephen Hawker<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":660,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[100,63],"tags":[7,116,23,115,27,113,28,114],"class_list":["post-628","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-church-2","category-poetry","tag-church","tag-cornish-ballads","tag-cornwall","tag-ecclesia","tag-morwenna","tag-morwennae-statio","tag-poem","tag-tower"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/628","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=628"}],"version-history":[{"count":26,"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/628\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":659,"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/628\/revisions\/659"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/660"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=628"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=628"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=628"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}