Under the Bracken

A body lay upon the hill
And over it the bracken swung;
The which had housed many an ill
Of hand and heart and tongue:
It was so foul the angels who
Fit the dead for living flew
From where the corpse was flung.

Then all the ills that had been sted
In the heart and in the head,
Every sin and shame he knew
When he gloried in the sun
Rose from hell again and flew,
Filled with indignation,
And did what the angel crew
Could not bring themselves to do.

They cleaned him more white than snow,
They purged him of everv stain,
Fouling their own bodies so
They might not be clean again:
But when the living from the dead
Arose again the angels said,
Behold, our work was not in vain.

The Hill of Vision [1912]