These lines from my distant cousin, the Silurist Poet Henry Vaughan, match my sentiments on a Thanksgiving Day morning. From his poem,
The Bee:
The truth, which once was plainly taught,With thorns and briars now is fraught.Some part is with bold fables spotted,Some by strange comments wildly blotted;And Discord—old Corruption's crest—With blood and blame hath stain'd the rest.So snow, which in its first descentsA whiteness, like pure Heav'n, presents,When touch'd by man is quickly soil'd,And after, trodden down and spoil'd.
O lead me, where I may be freeIn truth and spirit to serve Thee!Where undisturb'd I may converseWith Thy great Self; and there rehearseThy gifts with thanks; and from Thy store,Who art all blessings, beg much more.
Give me the wisdom of the bee,And her unwearied industry!That from the wild gourds of these days,I may extract health, and Thy praise,Who canst turn darkness into light,And in my weakness show Thy might.
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| Beehive Doorknob from the Salt Lake City Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints |
BTW, the religious corruption of which Vaughan complains is the Puritanism of Cromwell's dictatorship, Puritanism being the direct precussor to American Christian Fundamentalism. I, for one, will rejoice with Vaughan when White Anglo-Saxon Protestant Males are no longer in charge.
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