The School

Where is the school for each and all,

Where men become as children small,

And little ones are great?

Where love is all the task and rule,

The fee our all, and all at school,

Small, poor, of low estate?

Where to unlearn all things I learn,

From self and from all others turn,

One Master hear and see?

I learn and do one thing alone,

And wholly give myself to One

Who gives Himself to me.

My task, possessing nought, to give;

No life to have, yet ever live—

And ever losing, gain;

To follow, knowing not the way;

If He shall call, to answer, “Yea—

All hail all shame and pain!”

Where silent in His Holy Place

I look enraptured on His Face

In glory undefiled;

And know the heaven of His kiss,

The doing nought, the simple bliss

Of being but a child.

Where find the school, to men unknown,

Where time and place are past and gone,

The hour is ever NOW?

O soul! thou needest ask no more;

God tells thee of His open door:

Still, hearken thou!