Classic Poem

We tattered rhymers of the trade
Work with weak symbols for great power;
We paint a flower and call it Spring,
But Spring is more than any flower.

But 'mid the feeble names of things
The pallid types of tree and star,
God made three symbols on the earth
That truly mean the thing they are.

The first the circle—endlessness,
God's compass traced in sun and flower;
The next the cross, the eternal twain
Cross-purposes that make a power.

The third—your face—that single face,
Had I but seen it pictured well
On frescoes older than the gods,
It might have saved my soul from hell.

God made three signs that mean and are
Alone in all the world, these three;
God made two signs that make the world
And one that makes the world to me.