What would you have of us, O Son of
God?

Must we enter maimed and blind and lame

Into that kingdom where hearts are slain by love?

We will forsake all that we hold so dear,

Tread underfoot the love of kith and kin,

Venture far into a land unknown
and by a night in nakedness of faith

But we must ask, for we are poor, purblind:
Why did you choose us from that towering height

Whose end seemed death and bitter loneliness?

Was there no other way
for us who are but mortals, made

Of flesh and blood, with fallen hearts
 
That need to breath a lesser air than heaven’s heights?

There sounds no answer —

Only arms outstretched
in silent helplessness upon a tree

To what, embrace me there? To ravish me?

Yes! How breathlessly have I reached out to Thee

Who first reached down that I might die with Thee!!
 

Poem by
a Cloistered Poor Clare Colettine Nun

St. Bernadette of Lourdes

“Scio opera tua ... quia modicum habes virtutem, et servasti verbum Meum, nec non negasti Nomen Meum” 
“I know your works ... that you have but little power, and yet you have kept My word, and have not denied My Name.” (Apocalypse 3.8)

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