stranger (excerpt)

.

Closer and clearer

Than any wordy master

Thou inward Stranger

Whom I have never seen,

Deeper and cleaner

Than the clamorous ocean,

Seize up my silence

Hold me in Thy Hand!

Now act is waste

And suffering undone

Laws become prodigals

Limits are torn down

For envy has no property

And passion is none.

Look, the vast Light stands still

Our cleanest Light is One!

.

~ Thomas Merton

from The Collected Poems of Thomas Merton

art by picasso