I <br />OH, what is Christ, that we should call on Him? <br />Wasted Armenia, in her utter woe, <br />Dies in the mocking desert, calling so. <br />Hyænas tear her children limb from limb. <br />The clouds, soft dimpled once with cherubim, <br />Now screen the flight of Lucifers that strow <br />Their fiery seed where clustered households know <br />'Twixt sleep and death one flaring interim <br />Of agony, brief as the broken prayer. <br />What prayer? What Christ? Himself He could not save. <br />From first to last, when hath He saved His own? <br />Stephen's young body, battered stone by stone, <br />Edith Cavell in her most holy grave, <br />For His helpless host of martyrs witness bear. <br /> <br />II <br />Thought casts the challenge. Faith must lift the glove. <br />Most true it is Christ doth not save the flesh. <br />God's dreamy Nazarene, caught in the mesh <br />Of ignorance and malice, whitest dove <br />Net ever snared, took little care thereof. <br />Not His to plead with Pilate, nor to thresh <br />Those priestly lies. He died, to live afresh <br />Spirit, not body; not the Jew, but Love. <br />Love, the one Light in which all lusters meet, <br />Ultimate miracle, far goal of Time! <br />Even to-day, when all seems lost, they feel, <br />Those nations that like hooded sorrows kneel, <br />Their prayer's deep answer, loathing war as crime, <br />Longing to gather at Love's wounded feet.<br /><br />Katharine Lee Bates<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/what-is-christ/
