The Tapestry of Saint Geneviève and of Joan of Arc
La Tapisserie de sainte Geneviève et de Jeanne d’Arc
the tapestry
of Saint Geneviève
and of Joan of Arc
cahier for Christmas Day and for the novena of Saint Geneviève of the fourteenth series;
to madame Geneviève Favre
*communis urbis atque antiquae * patronae in fidem aeternam
FIRST DAY FOR FRIDAY 3 JANUARY 1913 FEAST OF SAINT GENEVIÈVE FOURTEEN HUNDRED AND FIRST ANNIVERSARY OF HER DEATH
As she had kept the sheep at Nanterre,
She was set to keep a quite different flock,
The most enormous horde in which wolf and lamb
Had ever confounded their shared misery.
And as she watched each evening all alone
In the farmyard or upon the water’s edge,
From the foot of the same willow and the same birch
She watches today over this monster of stone.
And when the evening comes that will close the day,
She is the aged and the ancient shepherdess
Who, gathering Paris and all that lies around,
Will lead with steady step and with light hand
For the last time into the final courtyard
The vastest flock to the right hand of the Father.
SECOND DAY FOR SATURDAY 4 JANUARY 1913
As she had kept the sheep at Nanterre
And as they were pleased with her exactness,
There was set beneath her crook and her concern
The most unsettled flock, but the most willing.
And as she kept watch before the presbytery,
Through evening after evening of long habit,
She watches today over this ingratitude,
Over this enormous inn and this phalanstery.
And when the evening comes in all its fullness,
She is the wise and the ancient shepherdess
Who, gathering Paris in her solicitude,
Will lead with steady step and with light hand
Into the courtyard of justice and of beatitude
The most obedient flock to the right hand of the Father.
THIRD DAY FOR SUNDAY 5 JANUARY 1913
She had down to the depth of the most hidden hamlet
The reputation throughout all Seine-et-Oise
That never had the wolf nor the seeker of quarrel
Been able to wrest from her the puniest lamb.
Everyone knew from Limours to Pontoise,
And the old boatmen told it down the stream,
That seated at the foot of the willow and the same birch
None had ever outplayed this humble village girl.
Saint, who brought back every evening to the fold
The whole flock entire, diligent shepherdess,
When the world and Paris come to the end of their lease,
May you with steady step and with light hand
Into the last courtyard through the last portal
Lead back beneath the vault and the double gate
The flock entire to the right hand of the Father.
FOURTH DAY FOR MONDAY 6 JANUARY 1913 EPIPHANY FIVE HUNDRED AND FIRST ANNIVERSARY OF THE BIRTH OF JOAN OF ARC
As the old grandmother in the strength of her age
Rejoices at the sight of the tender nursling,
The child at the breast and the youngest twin
Beginning life anew as if it were a heritage;
She makes of it in advance a very great person,
The boldest reaper at the time of harvest,
The boldest singer at the time of song
That has ever been seen in this humble village:
So the old saint, eternally wise,
Knew what would be the honor of her house
When she saw coming, dressed as a boy,
Well held in her cuirass and upright in the saddle,
Praying upon the pommel of her broadsword,
After nine hundred and twenty years the maid with the hard bodice:
And when she saw rise up above the horizon,
Supple upon the horse and the caparison,
The greatest beauty of all her lineage.
FIFTH DAY FOR TUESDAY 7 JANUARY 1913
As the old grandmother at the very end of her age
Delights to gaze upon her remotest daughter,
Born at the other end of the long family,
Beginning life anew as if it were a heritage;
She makes of her in advance a very great person,
Crusher, reaper with the full sickle,
The nimblest spindle, the most learned needle
That has ever been seen in this simple village:
So the old saint, eternally wise,
From the edge of the mountain and the double bank
Watched advancing in all her array,
Within a setting of candle and broadsword,
And the helmet given over to the hands of the little page,
The most holy girl after the holy Virgin.
SIXTH DAY FOR WEDNESDAY 8 JANUARY 1913
As God does nothing save by mercies,
She had to see the kingdom in tatters,
And her godchild city set ablaze with torches,
And ravaged in the hands of the most sinister hordes;
And hearts devoured by the basest discords,
And the dead pursued even into their tombs,
And a hundred thousand Innocents exposed to the crows,
And the hanged sticking out their tongues at the end of cords:
That she might see flower the greatest wonder
That ever God the Father in his simplicity
In the gardens of his grace and of his will
Has brought forth by force and by necessity;
After nine hundred and twenty years of prayer and vigil
When she saw coming toward the ancient city,
Keeping her heart intact in full adversity,
Masking beneath her visor an efficacy;
Holding a whole kingdom in her tenacity,
Living in full mystery with sagacity,
Dying in full martyrdom with vivacity,
The girl of Lorraine like to no other.
SEVENTH DAY FOR THURSDAY 9 JANUARY 1913
As God does nothing save by a simple shepherdess,
She had to see civil discord
Shake its torch upon the rooftops of the city
And join its fury to the foreign war;
She had to see the horrible fishwife
Harangue the lower folk and the servile rabble,
And from the wheat market up to the town hall
Ebb back the hiccup of the odious shrew:
That she might see come, marvelous and light,
By the paths of bramble and frail fern,
Folding her fair banners like a humble laundress;
Governing her battle like a good housekeeper,
Dragging the three Virtues in some forage-cart,
Toward the ancient vessel the young passenger.
EIGHTH DAY FOR FRIDAY 10 JANUARY 1913
As God does nothing save by poor wretchedness,
She had to see her city pain-stricken,
And the peoples trampled and her race withered,
The riot suppurating like a secret ulcer;
She had to see for her anniversary
The burst corpses that the Seine carries along,
And the source of grace apparently dried up,
And the child and the woman in the hands of the soldiery:
That she might see come on a war-horse,
Leading a whole people in the name of the Our Father,
Alone before her guard and her gendarmerie;
Engaged for day-labor like a working-woman,
Beneath the old oriflamme and the young banner
Casting a whole army at the feet of prayer;
Bearing the standard sown with embroidery
Where the name of Jesus comes in silverwork,
And the arms of the same in the same goldwork;
Spinning for her banners like a spinning-girl,
Having them soaked by some washerwoman,
Setting them to run in the enormous cauldron;
The arms of Jesus are his squared cross,
There is his armament, there is his armorial,
There is his armature and his armory;
Rinsing her fair banners in the river-water,
Washing them at the wash-house like a laundress,
Beating them at the paddle like a hireling;
The arms of Jesus are his thinned face,
And the tears and the blood in his bruised beard,
And the insult and the outrage in his own country;
Mending her banners like a commoner,
Setting them to dry on the front of the encampment,
Giving them to be kept by some sutleress;
The arms of Jesus are the crowd in fury
Acclaiming Barabbas and the pleading of the case,
And the tribunal and there is his inheritance;
Dyeing her fair banners like a dyer,
Having them ironed by some breeches-maker,
Adoring the good God like a seamstress;
The arms of Jesus are this barbarity,
And the decurion leading the decury,
And the centurion leading the century;
The arms of Jesus are the interrogation,
And the Roman lancers standing in the praetorium,
And the derisions ringing out in the courtroom;
The arms of Jesus are this penury,
And his flesh exposed to all inclemency,
And the devouring dogs and the bewildered pack;
The arms of Jesus are his cross from God,
It is to be a vagabond lying with neither fire nor place,
And the three crosses standing and his own in the middle;
The arms of Jesus are this pillaging
Of his poor flock, it is this lottery
Of his poor bundle that a soldier appropriates;
The arms of Jesus are this frail reed,
And the blood of his side flowing like a brook,
And the antique lictor and the antique fasces;
The arms of Jesus are this mockery
Right up to the foot of the cross, it is this scorn
Right up to the foot of death and it is the brusqueness
Of the executioner, of the troop and of the government,
It is the cold of the sepulchre and it is the burial,
The arms of Jesus are the disarmament;
The affront and the outrage, there is his industry,
The ash and the pebbles, there is his tenant-farm
And his apartments and his ducal peerage;
The arms of Jesus are the supple shrub
Plaited upon his fair brow like a frail web,
Sealing his kingship with a parodic seal;
The cowardly disciples, there is his brotherhood,
Peter and the cock’s crow, there is his seigniory,
There is his lieutenancy and his captaincy;
The washing of hands and the bragging
Of this keeper of the seals and the jest
Of these fine young dandies and the gallantry
Of these fine youths is his bakery,
And his bread of dust and of sweat kneaded,
And the sponge of gall and of vinegar-shop;
The cross well assembled in a double groove,
The ironic placard engraved with the chisel,
The bracket for the feet descending in a bevel;
Another woodcutter had cut this wood,
Another carpenter had hewn the cross,
But he himself, and no other, had borne this weight;
The image of the Virgin in tissue of silk,
And Saint Margaret in flowers of drapery,
And Saint Catherine and the tapestry
Where one sees Saint Michael dressed anew,
The Holy Spirit hovering in the figure of a bird,
And the archangel crushing Satan upon the snout;
But Satan resists him and by sorcery
And by procrastination and by petty pilferage
Has sworn to swallow up both Beauce and Brie;
The saints have upon their heads a very light hoop
That one may see well it is they, a sort of arch
Opens paradise, Jesus in his cradle
Looks upon Saint Joseph and out of mischief
Wants to tug his beard and the old man cries out
And pretends to bite so that the child may laugh;
But Satan watches them and smoking from the nostril
This venomous serpent, this filthy hog
Has sworn to infect the faubourg Saint-Marceau;
This rattlesnake with his rattling
Has boasted that he would (see his bragging)
Have his henchmen throw the saints onto the rubbish heap;
The arms of Jesus are the straw and the stable
And the bread and the wine and the cloth and the table,
And the most wretched, there is his constable;
The arms of Satan are the swindle,
An infernal effrontery, a sour buffoonery,
The learning of the learned and the canting hypocrisy;
The arms of Jesus are the piercing thorn,
It is the flower of his blood on the white hawthorn,
And the flowers of his tears on the red eglantine;
The pearl that comes down upon his tender cheek,
And the pearl that he drinks upon his impoverished lip,
There are his fine crystals and his jewelry;
The arms of Jesus are the green crown,
It is that brow which love and grace surround,
And the eternal flower that flowers upon his skin;
The pearl that comes down upon his lessened face
And that comes to moisten his shrivelled tongue,
There is his strongbox and his jewel-trade;
The arms of Jesus are our forfeiture,
The nails and the hammer, the seamless robe,
The man, the angel and the beast and the double nature;
The arms of Satan are the gullery,
It is scientism and it is artistry,
It is the laboratory and the toadying;
The arms of Satan are our forfeiture,
It is to have scattered the seamless robe,
It is the beast beneath the angel and the double nature;
The arms of Satan are buffoonery,
And it is the moralist and his infirmary,
And high eloquence and its pastry-cookery;
The arms of Jesus are the pain of man,
It is the road that leads and brings back to Rome,
It is the hand that strikes him and the fist that fells him;
The arms of Satan are the perfumery
Of the fluent writer and it is the candy-shop
Of the bitter writer and it is the prudery,
The blighted aridity of the old devout woman,
It is the soul in jam and the pear in compote,
And the bruised grape moldering in the hod;
The arms of Satan are the nail in the boot,
The vessel without helmsman, the fleet without pilot,
The pillory, the garrote, the shackle, the handcuff;
The arms of Satan are some juggling-trick,
It is the wolf in the farm and in the sheepfold,
It is the muffled fox in the henhouse;
The arms of Jesus are love and suffering,
The arms of Satan are envy and hatred,
And war is in the hands of every lady of the castle;
The arms of Satan are some forgery,
A secret document in some inn,
The arms of Satan are every devilry;
The arms of Jesus are the cross of Lorraine,
And the blood in the artery and the blood in the vein,
And the source of grace and the clear fountain;
The arms of Satan are the cross of Lorraine,
And it is the same artery and it is the same vein
And it is the same blood and the troubled fountain;
The arms of Jesus are the slave and the queen
And every company with its captain
And the double destiny and human distress;
The arms of Satan are the slave and the queen
And every company with its captain
And the same destiny and the same ill luck;
The arms of Jesus are death and life,
It is the rugged road incessantly climbed,
It is the soul into heaven insolently caught up;
The arms of Satan are life and death,
Desire and woman and the dice and chance
And the right of the harshest and the right of the strongest;
The arms of Jesus are death and life,
It is the sword of God that hesitates and swerves,
It is the faithful road obscurely followed;
The arms of Satan are life and death,
It is the immobile reef in the very middle of the harbor,
It is the immutable pain in the very middle of fate;
The arms of Jesus are life and death,
It is a happy shipwreck in the very middle of the harbor,
It is the fairest omen in the very middle of fate;
The arms of Satan are life and death,
It is the peril of the sea, it is man in his wrong,
The thief on the watch, the tyrant in his stronghold;
The arms of Jesus are life and death,
It is God in his justice and Satan in his wrong,
The beauty of the purest, the just one in his stronghold;
The arms of Jesus are life and death,
It is the child and the woman and the secret of fate,
The ship hauled up in the hollow of the harbor;
The arms of Satan are man who swerves,
It is the two fists bound and it is the soul enslaved,
It is vengeance tirelessly pursued;
The arms of Jesus are the two hands joined,
And the thorn and the rose and the nails and the points,
And on the deathbed the poor souls anointed;
It is the alternating choir of martyrs and of holy women,
It is the conjugated choir of sobs and of laments,
The temple, the steps, the pilasters, the plinths;
The arms of Satan are the green terebinth,
That resinous tree and it is the colocynth,
That bitter gourd and it is the dismal wormwood;
The arms of Satan are the two fists bound,
The arms of Jesus the humbled hearts,
The poor on their knees, the suppliants bowed;
The arms of Jesus are the beautiful hyacinth
Laid out as a carpet in a beautiful enclosure,
Softer than wool and more supple and better dyed;
The arms of Jesus are the bell that tolls
For the seven sacraments, it is the order and the constraint,
And the faithful drawing of the well-painted image;
The arms of Satan are the bell that tolls
For the fire of hell, it is the city compelled
To pass through chance, it is every soul repainted
With a false brush, it is every rule infringed
In the name of some rule and every faith restricted
In the name of some master and every city girt
With a fraudulent rampart and every flower discolored
From much raining and every flame extinguished
From much burning, every misfortune reached
At the threshold of every death and the dismal lament
Along every life and the ephemeral imprint
Of our steps on the sand and the mortal embrace
Of the two impure lovers: the body, the soul constrained;
The arms of Satan are the trick and the feint,
The dread, the envy and the fat that oozes,
And the double concert of asthmas and of coughing fits,
And the complicated hearts and the cares and the fears
And the hearts twisted like labyrinths;
The arms of Jesus are the eternal imprint
Of his steps on the sand and the immortal embrace
Of the two most pure spouses: the body and the soul made fast;
The arms of Jesus are hunger satisfied,
It is the glorious body, it is not survival,
It is the eternal table abundantly served;
Satan is vengeance itself satisfied,
The arms of Satan are a clockwork,
A masterpiece of skill and of locksmithery;
But the key is Jesus and Jesus is the door,
And the door of heaven is taken only by main force,
And all the locksmiths will remain at the door;
The arms of Jesus are that great escort
Which Rome lent to him, it is the rough cohort
That did him honor and it is the cross he bears;
The arms of Satan are of the same sort,
For it is the same Rome and it is the same escort
And the same cohort and the same Dead Sea;
The arms of Jesus are that he comforts us
In our discomfort and that he bears us back
To the first paradise and that he brings us
The pardon of his father and that he carries us off
To the final paradise and that he transports us
From the exile of sin toward what alone matters
And it is our salvation and that he conveys us
To the kingdom of grace and that he upholds us,
Us and our sin that vast mortmain
That he bears upon his shoulder and that he exhorts us
By his very silence and that he knocks at the door
And that man is in the wind like the dead leaf;
The arms of Satan are the same mortmain,
The same disarray, that he discomforts us
In our comfort and that he bears us back
To the sin of origin and that he brings us back
The contempt of pardon and that he carries us back
To the science of evil and that he re-deports us
Toward the land of the convict-camp and that he transports us back
To the shadowy kingdom where he himself bears
The weight of a whole world and that he exhorts us
By fine compliments and that he scratches at the door,
And that man is light as the dead leaf
And as it rots beneath the feet of the wood-louse;
The arms of Jesus are life and death,
It is a solid anchorage in the fine middle of the harbor,
And it is the great sharing in the fine middle of fate;
The arms of Jesus are life and death,
It is a happy mooring in the very middle of the harbor,
It is the great heritage in the very middle of fate;
The arms of Jesus are life and death,
It is the good neighborhood in the very middle of the harbor
And the pilgrimage in the very middle of fate;
The arms of Jesus are life and death,
It is the companionship in the very middle of the harbor,
And it is the setting-sail in the very middle of fate;
The arms of Satan are the seven sins,
And the simpering with leaning airs,
And the shameful springs cunningly released;
The arms of Jesus are the three Virtues,
And the bent torsos and the battered loins,
And the galley-slaves beaten and beaten again;
The arms of Satan are the crooked method,
The blood of the auricle and the blood of the aorta,
The blood of the ventricle and of the portal vein;
The arms of Jesus are all the blood of the heart,
The blood of the victim and the blood of the conqueror,
The blood of the noble stag and the blood of the huntsman;
The arms of Satan are the seven sins
Boarded four by four and softly lying down
In the mad galley with plumed canopies;
The arms of Jesus are the barque of Peter,
Which, always fluctuating and always boatman-like,
Scrapes with its nets the bottom of the river;
The arms of Jesus are the barque of Peter,
It is the old fisher of men sitting on his behind,
Depopulating the Ocean, the lake and the river;
The arms of Jesus are the seven sacraments
In the barque of Peter and the seven vessels
That follow behind and the seven monuments
That will never perish, the seven crownings,
Which are the seven sorrows, the seven flowerings
Of the tree of grace and the seven firmaments;
The arms of Jesus are this unique nave,
Steering close-hauled under this unique chief,
Always in full peril and always without mishap;
The arms of Jesus are this unique fief,
Held by a single man armed with some brief,
Always in full peril and always without grievance;
The arms of Jesus are the eternal pain
Seated in the hollow of the bed of every human race
Now death is in the hands of every lady of the castle;
The arms of Jesus are the great week
That starts from Holy Monday, it is the great novena
That starts from the third of January and it is the full barque;
The arms of Jesus are this unique nave,
The boat toward the lock moored in the canal,
The boat carpentered by old Saint Joseph;
But it is also Jacob and the first Joseph,
Moses upon the Nile in a narrow craft,
And the people of God governed once again;
The arms of Jesus are the blood of his vein
And the blood of his heart, the sobs of his pain
And the immense sob of every human race;
The arms of Satan are the deaf gangrene
And the obscure headache and the heavy migraine
And the pride and the tares and the bad seed;
The arms of Jesus are the double prayer,
The one walking before, the other walking behind,
Morning-like as he is and daily toward him;
The arms of Jesus are the double prayer,
The one arriving before, the other advancing behind,
Vesper-like as he is and daily toward him;
It is also the secret, the nocturnal prayer,
The unchanging regret in a taciturn heart,
And the death of love and the ashes in the urn;
The arms of Jesus are the Angelus of evening
And that of morning, the calm wayside-altar
In the procession, the dazzling monstrance
Swung above the brows like an ardent sun;
The arms of Satan are the claw and the tooth,
The badly turned-up nose, the impudent gaze;
The arms of Jesus are the calm of evening,
It is the procession seated at the wayside-altar
Of leaves and flowers, it is the heavy monstrance
Raised above the brows like a rising sun,
The arms of Jesus are the rain and the wind
That blow upon the nave and it is the fervent heart;
It is the fruit that ripens on the shelves of the dresser,
It is the child who lies down and who bids you good evening
And falls asleep praying, it is the heavy monstrance
Lifted above the brows like a setting sun,
It is the supple little valley, it is the slanting hill,
The church on the plain and the prose and the chant;
It is the grape spurting beneath the enormous press,
It is the pond spread across the spillway,
It is the incense swung in the heavy censer;
The arms of Satan are the staggering shield,
The alluring word, the parching breath,
The plain without church and the nettle and the field;
The arms of Jesus are the carving squire,
The good and the wicked, the fine merchant ship,
The church on the plain and the man on the field;
The arms of Jesus are the lovely godmother
And the lovely baptism and the lovely gift,
And the oats and the rye and the good seed
And it is the groundsel and it is the seven sins
By contrition and the loosened knots
Of Satan’s net and the severed cords;
The arms of Satan are the seven debauched,
And it is the prince-bishop and the seven bishoprics,
And the temptations running in the marketplaces;
The arms of Jesus are seven hundred bishoprics,
And it is the pope-bishop and a hundred archbishoprics,
And the slave and the child sold in the marketplaces;
The arms of Jesus are his head bowed,
His elbow, his knee, his flayed shoulder,
His stomach, his loins, his dislocated hip;
His beard, his hair, his torn garments,
His chest, his arms, his bound wrists,
The most skillful springs in an instant unhooked;
It is in old Paris the Sunday-dressed crowd
On a Sunday morning, it is the thirst quenched
At the chalice of pure gold, the poor woman bent
Over a poorer one and it is the love hidden
In the poorest soul and the suffering laid
In the bed of every man and every barley reaped;
The arms of Jesus are every wave poured
In a fevered throat and every soul sketched
At the corner of every lip and every flower strewn
At the foot of bleeding feet and every weapon notched
From much service and the branch stripped
From much producing and the chopped straw;
The arms of Jesus are love and pain,
And love is in the hands of the henchmen of hatred,
And death is in the hands of every lady of the castle;
The arms of Jesus are life and death,
It is the fertile river, it is the eternal contribution
Of silt and slime in the very middle of the harbor;
The arms of Jesus are this urchin who sleeps,
It is the shame and the pain and his brother fate,
And love is in the hands of the henchmen of death;
The arms of Satan are the sentimentality,
It is supposedly the right, the humanitarianism,
And it is the trickery and it is the niggardliness;
The arms of Satan are the beast let loose,
The gratuitous dishonor, the shame chewed over,
The flock badly led, the earth badly spaded;
The arms of Satan are the limb torn off,
The bud cut away, the branch detached,
The ox goaded, the horse whipped;
The arms of Jesus are the high terrace
From which the source of grace falls back as a fountain-jet,
And the basin with grave flank and the blood of the race;
The arms of Satan are the low menace
At the corners of every lip and the sticky trail
That the slimy slug leaves upon the flower;
The arms of Satan are a pointed mind,
It is the body in tatters, it is the heart contested,
The badly paid executioner, the lawsuit debated;
The arms of Jesus are the heart contested,
It is the whole body and the same virtue
And the grape crushed and the wheat threshed;
The arms of Jesus are the grain beneath the millstone,
The grape beneath the press and the bird in the maw,
And the son in the father and the child in the grandmother;
But Satan watches him and this vile little worm
Has sworn to smother under shadow and bushel
The light and the lamp and the plaine Monceau;
The arms of Satan are a wager,
It is his bragging and his effrontery,
And it is the philologist and his ironmongery;
The arms of Satan are our servitude,
It is our stupefaction, our long habit
And the night and the vigil and the lamp and the study;
The arms of Jesus are the beatitude
And it is the parable and the mildness
And it is when he wept over this multitude;
The arms of Satan are our quietude
And it is the theorem and it is certainty,
Power, knowing and decrepitude;
The arms of Jesus are the cutting edge of fate,
It is that point on the sword where life and death
Outwit the body and the soul in the very middle of the harbor;
The arms of Jesus are our disquiet,
The axiom, the rule and our uncertainty,
Duty, power and vicissitude;
The arms of Jesus are our servitude,
It is all solitude and all fullness,
And our turpitude and our weariness;
The arms of Satan are the squalling,
The vote, the mandate and the suffragery,
And the lawyering and the haranguing;
The arms of Jesus are his solicitude,
And our ingratitude and his exactness,
And the similitude and all rectitude;
The arms of Satan are pure boasting,
It is old bric-a-brac, antique trumpery,
Fabricated, fake, ironwork;
The arms of Satan are the forbidden fruit,
It is the murder of Abel, it is the blood spilled,
It is Judas taken down, it is Judas hanged again;
The arms of Satan are the net stretched,
It is the doubtful word and the insinuation,
And every controversy and every misunderstanding;
The arms of Satan are Jesus Christ sold,
It is the thirty pieces of silver, it is Joseph let down
To the bottom of the cistern and captive sold;
The arms of Satan are the lost race,
It is the braided noose, it is the twisted cord,
Every flesh assailed and every flesh bitten;
The arms of Satan are all the residue
And the lees and the scum and it is the individual
And it is the commentary and the report rendered;
The arms of Satan are every debt due
Irremissibly, the shame suspended,
And by its governor every city surrendered;
The arms of Jesus are Satan confounded,
Every ditch reinforced, every rampart defended,
Every ground regained upon the lost ground;
And the debt remitted and the debt restored
By the brother to his brother and the lost sheep
And every soul assailed and every soul bitten;
The arms of Jesus are the night poured out
For the rest of man and the farm sold
To pay the taxes and the shorn sheep;
The arms of Jesus are the snow melted
In the spring sun, the axe suspended
On the day of judgment and it is the soul distraught
By its unworthiness, it is the great expanse
And the Christmas tree and the split log
And it is since Adam the awaited news;
The arms of Jesus are the good fortune,
And it is the Creator creating the creature,
And the seal of the Lord setting the signature;
The arms of Satan are the caricature
And the counterfeit of every signature
And man judging man and the magistracy
Seated at the tribunal, it is the soured letter,
The dismal literality already rotting,
The arms of Satan are the chancellery;
The arms of Satan are the joke,
That spoiled sauce and it is the inn
For bad travelers and it is the drunkenness
With elbows on the table and the cackling
And the ribaldry and the surliness
And the gawking and the foolery;
The arms of Jesus are the carpentry,
The workbench, the smoothing-plane and the joinery,
The saw and the rasp and the cabinet-making,
The widow’s mite and the good workman;
The arms of Satan are the vile usurer,
The armorer, the warrior, the manufacturer;
The arms of Satan are the rogue’s trade,
The bad companion, the cronyism,
The bad comrade and the canting hypocrisy
And the bad boy; it is the oblique glance
Cast at the neighbor, the famished folk
Beneath the enormous and Pantagruelian feasting;
The arms of Jesus are the Catholic faith
Enshrined at a high price, the round basilica,
And it is the public peace and the holy relic;
The arms of Satan are all that complicates
The very simple existence and it is when he implicates
The innocent in crime and in the diabolical;
The arms of Jesus are the biblical cedar,
The salutation, the angelic fervor,
The annunciation of the evangelical era;
The arms of Satan are his cunning and his claque
And his sly and Mephistophelian clap,
And his whispered and Machiavellian quarrel;
The arms of Jesus are the light caïque
Of Peter on the lake, it is the archaic archangel
Closing paradise, it is the Judaic faith
And the first law, it is the Hebraic race
And the trunk of Israel, and it is the mosaic
Of the virtue of clerics, of the virtue of laymen;
The arms of Jesus are the mosaic law,
The ten commandments to the liturgical people,
And that he has by no means crossed out from apostolic Rome;
The arms of Jesus are the heroic death
Of the martyr in the arena and the stoic sweetness
Of the saint and it is also the prosaic virtue;
The arms of Satan are the saïque curve,
The supple cargo-vessel and it is the Chaldean art
And the virtue of the rich and of the pharisaic;
And it is the sour rejoinder and the somnambulistic,
And the Cyrenaic and the Aristotelian,
And the worst of all it is indeed when he explains;
The arms of Jesus are the ardent petition
Of the poor to the governor, it is the parabolic,
And it is the eight beatitudes under apostolic Rome,
And it is the king of France and it is the republic
And it is the brief of the pope and the heavy encyclical
Amid private mournings and public virtue;
The arms of Satan are the vile publican,
The tax-gatherer of Rome and the arrant rascal
Who fools the honest man and who plays the cad;
The avaricious toll-keeper, the servile sequin,
The unfaithful shepherd, the cloak of Harlequin
Of vice and of virtue, the coarse mannequin
That frightens the sparrows, the rough jerkin
Over the war armor and the heavy saddle-rim
Over the war-horse and the tiresome lampoon;
The arms of Jesus are the Samaritan,
The wounded one taken in, the poor Franciscan,
The arms of Jesus are the republican;
The arms of Satan are the false symbolic,
The stone in tablet form, the marble in majolica,
(The stone of Jesus, it is the pure Pentelic);
The arms of Satan are all hyperbolic,
The mask of Satan is every bucolic
Modulating beneath the beech a pure idyllic;
The arms of both are the melancholic,
Whether it has come down from the old biblical cedar,
Whether it has come back up from the young republic;
The arms of Satan are every idolatry,
Every reassortment, every replastering,
Every jumble, every patching, every frolicry;
The arms of Jesus are the cult of dulia
Or of subservience, it is the cult of latria
Or of adoration, it is the cult of fatherland
Or of native land; and demonolatry
Returns toward Satan with zoolatry,
With psychiatry, with chemiatry,
With the ergot of rye and the other rots,
And the phylloxeras and the withered vines,
And the dried-up wells and the exhausted races;
The arms of Jesus are the poor mount,
The donkey’s foal and it is the stiffness
Of his cudgeled loins and it is the sepulture
In a borrowed tomb, it is the lamb without pasture,
It is the barque of Peter wandering and without masting,
And the praetor of Rome and it is the prefecture
And the prefect of Rome and that humble roof,
That thatch close to the ground and the only carriage
With a single horse and the old enclosure
Of bad wire and the offspring
Awaiting beneath the lamp a humble nourishment,
Vaguely hoping for a pot of jam;
The arms of Satan are this dictatorship
Of those seven who are seven upon the same mount,
Upon a rotten horse held by the belt;
The arms of Jesus are holy Scripture
From the first book and it is all uprightness
From the first step and it is every armature
Holding its man stiff and it is every skeleton
Holding its man firm and every architecture
Holding the house full and low in stature;
The arms of Satan are the bad doctor,
(But are there any good ones?), it is the bad actor
Who plays against sense and the bad reader
Who reads against the text and it is the detractor
Who detracts and dis-tracks and the simple elector
Who retracts and votes and the dismal inspector
Who watches and surveys and the harsh director
Who watches and governs and the heavy protector
Who watches and weighs and plays the rector;
The arms of Satan are the contradictor
Who says at the start: But no, it is the antique lictor
And the antique fasces, it is Satan destructor;
The arms of Satan are Satan constructor
Of the satanic parvis, it is Satan conductor
Of man toward his ruin and Satan redactor
Of the false news and it is every abstractor
Of the quintessence and every counterfeiter
Who will be prosecuted, it is Satan collector
Of taxes for his State, it is Satan corrector
In his bad newspaper, and treacherous translator
Into his bad patois, and crooked producer
Of adulterated products, brilliant introducer
To the kingdom of hell, deceptive instructor
Of bad recruits and sinister amateur
Of art for his collections and shrewd shipowner
Of shipwreck and superb and docile impostor,
The arms of Satan are Satan seducer;
The arms of Satan are the severe coat
Of mail and it is also the gaze that blinks
Beneath the heavy visor and beneath the Burgundian helm;
The arms of Jesus are the future race,
It is the rich missal, it is the miniature,
And heaven and hell and earth in painting;
The arms of Satan are the misadventure,
The crowned traitor, the bad reading,
The arms of Satan are literature;
The arms of Jesus are nobility and commonalty
Equal before his face and the fine sculpture
At the church portal and the fine molding;
The arms of Jesus are the rich hanging
Before the tabernacle and the red dyeing
Of the priest’s robe and of the crosses of torture;
The arms of Satan are every conjecture
Marauding upon the text and it is every imposture,
Every penciled note, every maculature;
And it is every lesson that is not the reading,
And it is every fashion that is not the making,
And it is every harvest that is not thick and hard;
And it is every prison that is not the capture,
And every bond that is not the rupture,
Every ash, every fire that is not lasting fire;
The arms of Satan are the offhand bearing,
It is the false elegance and every conjuncture
Where the upright man is set in oblique posture;
The arms of Satan are the false culture
That sows the couchgrass and it is the blanket
Stolen from the old horse and it is every opening
That has not been opened and every closure
That has not been closed and every quadrature
That has not been squared and it is every arcature
That has not been arched and it is every erasure
In the middle of the page and every ligature
That is not for the graft and every horticulture
That is not for the flower, every arboriculture
That is not for the fruit, every viticulture
That is not for the wine, it is every agriculture
That is not for the wheat, it is every apiculture
That is not for the honey, every sylviculture
That is not for the wood and it is every cutting
That has not taken root and it is every grinding
That is not from the mill and every portraiture
That is not the model and every investiture
That does not come from God, it is the suture-point
When it is badly sewn, it is the judicature
Of man over a man and the candidature
Seated in white robe at the threshold of the praetorship;
The arms of Satan are the nomenclature
And the enumeration, it is every supplying
That is not at good weight, it is the fine dentition
Of the beasts in the arena and it is the shopfront
That masks the house and it is every joint
That articulates badly and it is every fracture
That is not reduced, it is every contracture
That is not resolved and it is every structure
That is not organic and it is every questorship
For which one is a candidate and it is every texture
That is not of good thread and it is every mixture
That is not of good wine and it is every grinding
That is not of good bread and it is every pasture
That is not of good grain and it is every enclosure
That is not of good wood and it is every questorship
That requisitions at false weight, strikes at false measure,
Pays in false coin and lends at usury;
The arms of Jesus are the legislature
Of the ten commandments and it is the tablature
Of the tables of the law, it is the nunciature
When the nuncio is the pope’s and the judicature
When the judge fears God, it is the magistracy
When it is magisterial and the clerisy
When the clerk is a man of honor and it is the prelature
When the bishop is an Aignan or a Saint Bonaventure
Or a Saint Côme or a Saint Loup, the sacrificature
When it is himself the victim and it is every vesture
That clothes soul and body and it is every shearing
That will not flay the weak creature;
The arms of Jesus are the beautiful parish
Seated in the heart of France and it is the noble anguish
Of the priest concerned that his flock should grow again;
The arms of Jesus are the lovely provender
Scattered in the rack, it is the thyme, the lavender,
And the rose and the carnation and the supple garland;
The arms of Jesus are the good neighborhood
Among the poor folk, it is the poor village
And the church in the middle, it is the companionship
Among good companions, it is the pilgrimage
Among good pilgrims, it is the poor household
Between the man and the woman and the long marriage;
The arms of Jesus are the well-behaved children
Seated at the chimney-corner, it is the fine images
That one sees on the stained-glass windows and it is the three Magi;
The arms of Satan are the magicians
And the sorcery and the false conversations
And the free discourses at the council of the elders;
The arms of Jesus are the poor family,
The brothers and the sister, the boys and the girl,
The spindle heavy with wool and the learned needle;
The arms of Jesus are all the pagan hearts:
Provided they be baptized and made Christian,
He makes of them the purest of all his parishioners;
The arms of Jesus are all the plebeians:
Unless they be courted and made into good-for-nothings,
He makes of them the firmest of his steady supports;
The arms of Jesus are the good citizens:
When grace takes hold of them by its secret means,
He makes of them the surest of his dean-curates;
The arms of Jesus are docility,
It is faith, hope and it is charity,
It is the woman and the child and fidelity;
The arms of Jesus are fragility,
It is civic virtue and it is liberty,
It is the woman and the child and it is poverty;
The arms of Jesus are simplicity,
It is eternal peace and it is in the city
A whole river of grace and of efficacy;
The arms of Jesus are the necessity
Of labor and bread and it is in the city
A whole river of grace and of felicity;
The arms of Jesus are sagacity,
The pardon of offense and it is in the city
A whole river of grace and of vivacity;
The arms of Jesus are the begging
Of the lowliest wretch and it is in the city
A whole river of grace and of tenacity;
The arms of Satan are the crooked road,
The hidden footpath, the horse struck down
With its four shoes in the air and the stubborn mule;
The arms of Satan are the false tenderness
Lying in the bed of man and the soft sloth
That sleeps all day long and is unconcerned
With the poor and with the child and it is the charmstress
With her learned words and the soothsayer
And her old grimace and it is the enchantress
With her old ointments and it is the dryness
Of the heart and it is the true and it is the false adroitness
Of the very cunning man; it is the man who transgresses
The old laws of man and it is the man who plaits
The hemp of the gibbet and the man who progresses,
The arms of Satan are the man who grows fat
On the blood of the wretched, the serpent that raises
Its head and it is also the vintner who presses
The grape and makes spurt forth the sweet wine and drunkenness;
The arms of Jesus are every fortress
That holds and it is the noble and the pure caress
Of mother to child and it is the clumsiness
Of the man not cunning and the muffled tenderness
Of mother to daughter so that there may reappear
In this nascent child a same tenderness
And in time to come a same caress
And this same gaze and this same blond
Tress that will flower, this same distress
That will be consoled, and this poor little soul
And in the latter time a same gladness;
The arms of Jesus are the man who addresses
Himself directly to God, it is the man who addresses
Himself to some patron saint, it is the man who rises
Against iniquity, it is the man who hastens
To bind up the wounded, it is the cool compress
Upon the burning wound and the man who grows fat
On sobs and on tears, on pain and on distress,
And on a regret more beautiful than that very tenderness,
And the weapon in the hands of the ardent and avenging angel
At the threshold of paradise so that there may appear
The soul ever hunted and ever huntress,
The soul ever slave and at the same time mistress,
The soul ever child and ever sinner;
The arms of Jesus are the letter and the spirit,
But it is the spirit that leads and the spirit that nourishes,
And the letter is there only as a written word;
The arms of Jesus are the letter and the spirit,
It is the father who scolds and the child who smiles,
It is the Father and the Son and it is the Holy Spirit;
The letter is what kills and the spirit gives life,
And the letter is death and the spirit is life,
And the letter is pride and the letter is envy;
It is the spirit that commands and the letter that serves,
It is the spirit that asks and the letter that loses
And it is the spirit that saves and preaches in the full wilderness;
It is the spirit that governs and the spirit that leads
Man toward a single point and the letter that follows
Toward the ogre’s lamp and it is the spirit that bakes
The bread when it is hot, it is the spirit that deduces
Jesus from the old Adam and once again induces
Israel into Jesus whom the letter reduces;
It is the spirit that fights and the letter that flees,
It is the spirit that labors and the spirit that produces
The straw, the good grain, the leaf, the good fruit;
And the letter has never made anything but a little noise,
It is she who seduces and it is she who harms,
And the letter and the spirit are the day and the night;
But the spirit and the letter are the night and the day,
The arms of Jesus are honor and love
And the king in his camp and the king in his court;
The arms of Jesus are the fire in the oven,
The dough and the leaven and it is the bread of the day,
And it is king David withdrawn into his tower;
The arms of Jesus are every man proscribed
Who will be recalled, it is the young conscript
Who will be summoned, it is the young man inscribed
Upon the eternal book and it is the contrite heart
That will be quickened, it is the note subscribed
That will be presented, it is the happiness described
One day upon the mountain and the honest rescript
From the king of heaven and the pardon prescribed
By the new law, it is God himself transcribed
From Moses into Jesus, it is Satan circumscribed,
It is all that was needed that Jesus might suffer,
The arms of Jesus are above all Jesus Christ:
It is all that was needed that Jesus might open
The door of the tomb, that Jesus might offer
The first sacrifice and might render up the spirit;
It is all that was needed that Jesus might cover
The sinner before God, that he might rediscover
The road of salvation and that he might undertake
To climb back up the slope and that he might take himself in hand
And take the world again and that man might learn
The difficult road and that he might unlearn
The road without stones and that one day in Gaul,
Other Roman soldiers, the cloak upon the shoulder,
The torso well molded in their plates of metal,
Riding by the road thick as a mole,
The lance between the fingers as one holds a pole,
One day in midwinter beneath the snow of the pole,
Along the white birches, along the same willow,
Seeing a vagabond, some escaped from jail,
Another centurion, of those Rome enlists,
From his military cloak might at last uncover himself;
It is all that was needed that man might fall in love
With the only love that lasts and that he might fall out of love
With the only love that passes and that he might be mistaken
As one must be mistaken and that then he might understand
All that must be understood and that then he might take from it
All that must be taken from it and that then he might surprise
The badly kept secret, the manuscript secret
That is not in the letter and hides itself in the spirit;
The arms of Jesus are the flowered road,
But more than the spring gallantly reflowered,
It is the severe autumn just then unflowered;
And the flower of Mary is the flowering rose,
But more than the humble rose in spring reflowered,
It is the autumn rose humbly unflowered;
The arms of Jesus are the flowered little valley,
But more than the spring incessantly flowered,
And more than the spring insolently flowered,
And more than the spring impudently flowered,
And more than the spring shamelessly flowered,
It is the chaste autumn forever unflowered;
The arms of Jesus are a people cherished
Like a son who returns, it is a dying man healed
By his extreme unction, it is a people seasoned
By a just war and the sailor perished
At the peril of the sea, the vessel landed
In the hollow of the harbor, a whole people fed
With a few dried fish, a whole world fed
With a single victim and the grape ripened
For the wine of the chalice and the other wine soured
For the sponge and the lance and the vinegar gone sour;
The arms of Jesus are the leaven kneaded
In the midst of the dough and itself soured;
The arms of Satan are the dried-up river,
It is at the knacker’s the quartered horse,
It is the famished child, it is the bread grown dear;
The arms of Satan are the heart badly healed
Of the old wound and it is the heart dried up
From much bleeding and the heart badly nourished
From much fasting, it is everything that dries up,
It is everything that perishes, everything that wastes away,
And everything that sours and everything that rots;
The arms of Satan are the impoverished sap,
It is the blood spilled, the stunted branch,
The withered branch, the snubbed prude;
The arms of Satan are everything that withers,
Belittles, debases, insults, lessens,
It is everything that despises and everything that bruises;
The arms of Jesus are everything that nourishes,
It is everything that buds and everything that perishes
In the gardens of Touraine and everything that ripens;
The arms of Jesus are a heart all flowered,
More than the young heart in spring reflowered,
It is the heart in autumn forever unflowered;
The arms of Satan are peace and war,
The peoples disemboweled, the sacraments cast to the ground,
The shame, the terror, the military rage;
The arms of Jesus are war and peace,
The peoples respected and the last harnesses
Of war suspended from the pediments of palaces;
The arms of Satan are the horror of war,
The peoples panicked, Jesus upon Calvary,
The blood, the cry of death, the voluntary murder;
The arms of Jesus are the honor of war,
The peoples restored, Jesus upon Calvary,
The blood, the sacrifice and the voluntary death:
That she might see come beneath such a standard
Of Jesus Christ the soldier against Satan the brawler,
Toward old Saint Étienne and old Saint Médard;
That she might see come by a country road,
Like a young child who comes toward her grandmother,
Through the woods of Puteaux, through the fields of Nanterre;
That she might see come ardent and military,
Obedient and firm and gentle and willing,
Over Boulogne and Neuilly, over Puteaux and Nanterre;
Steadfast and docile, alert and upright,
And prompt at maneuver and little given to procedure,
Destined to perish like an adventuress;
Well in the saddle in front of her cavalry,
Masking her bombardiers and her bombardery,
Trailing like a net her heavy infantry;
Rallying her drums that were beating for the Mass,
Scolding those brigands who ran to confession,
Deferent to the three voices that sealed their promise;
Having set the soldiers to the sacramental pace,
Having set the priests to the regulation pace,
And lodged the Virtues in regimental order;
Going well and valiant and without giddiness,
Coming well and pleasant and without coquetry,
Speaking well and talking and without chatter;
Revering the caskets set with precious stones
Where the relics of the saints worked in goldsmithery
Repose upon the altar and upon the embroidery;
Wise as an old grandmother in her tender youth,
A younger child who had conquered the fairest birthright,
Grave and with eyes clearer than those of a canoness,
The greatest saint after holy Mary.
NINTH DAY FOR SATURDAY 11 JANUARY 1913
As God does nothing save by companionship,
She had to see those evil companions,
The English, (the French), the traitor Burgundians
Dismember the kingdom as if it were an apanage;
She had to see that monstrous household,
And the gibbets sprouting like mushrooms,
And the wall and the roof and the angle of the gables
All dripping with murder and with the blood of carnage;
She had to see all that horse-trading,
The corpses stark naked packed in rows of onions,
The wounded mutilated dragged upon their stumps,
The dead and the dying drifting as they swam;
She had to see that horrible gearing
Seize the whole kingdom and those evil boys
Break upon the wheel a whole people and roast the harvests,
Come forth from the lower folk or from the high baronage;
The arms of Jesus are the lovely godmother
And it is the lovely baptism and the lovely sugared almonds,
But more than the procession and the apogees
It is the mourning and the ruin and the shame and the pain;
She had to see by this libertinage
Dissipate that treasure of honor we gain,
And desert the God whom we accompany,
As one deserts a dead man in a poor village;
She had to see by this vagabondage
Turned back this past from which we move away,
She had to see the evils we treat
Mount along us like a scaffolding;
She had to see by false testimony
Give the lie to the words for which we bear witness,
She had to see the urn where we bathe
Collapse from defilement and from debauchery;
She had to see by all this marauding
Gathered the moldy fruits which we disdain,
She had to see the city where we reign
Dismantled in the hands of all this filching;
She had to see by so much childishness
Debased that faith with which we are imbued,
She had to see the blood with which we bleed
Bleed from the same heart and from the same courage;
She had to see by foolish chatter
Blighted the august dogma that we teach,
And see drying up the grace where we bathe,
Lustral and baptismal, in a heavy banter;
She had to see by all this brigandage
Committed the crimes at which we are indignant,
And the ringing coins that we line up
Melt in the crucible of pride and counterfeiting;
She had to see by all this misbreeding
Degenerate the race to which we belong,
And the eternal words that we underline
Fall into silence and into mockery;
She had to see by all this make-up
Falsified the signature we countersign,
And the term and the death that we assign ourselves
Approach every day like a distant shore;
She had to see this jealous rage
Assail the barracks where we are quartered,
And the infamous tavern we designate
By an insulting name overflow onto the beach;
She had to see this savage hatred
Pervert the fate to which we resign ourselves,
And the bramble and the nettle on which we scratch
Our hands entangle themselves in the young thicket;
She had to see on the towpath
Uprooted the boundary-stone against which we knock,
And see the corner where we shelter ourselves
Refuse us the lodging and the bread of the journey;
She had to see in this common shipwreck
Sink the broken ark that we lay hold of,
And see the great army where we grumble,
(But we are always marching), undergo this wintering;
She had to see by such sabotage
Denatured the work at which we labor,
And see the insult to which we are averse
Reign and govern under the figure of outrage;
She had to see along the bulwark
Cast into the water the gold we save,
And see the yardarm where we put out one eye
Sway and fall through the effect of the pitching;
She had to see in that same wintering
The ardor we feign vanish from cold,
And see the pain in which we sulk
Vanish in death into a fine sarcophagus;
She had to see in this setting-sail
Advance the galley where as captives we groan,
And see the heavy nave where we complain
Moan in its shrouds and its joinery woods;
She had to see by a common sharing
Arrive justly the fate that we fear,
And the law that saves us and that we infringe
Exposed to perish in that same shipwreck;
She had to see in the same mooring
Sink the despair that we alone embrace,
And see that order to which we constrain ourselves
Lose its rowing-benches and its ballast;
She had to see in this common harm
Bend the discipline to which we constrain ourselves,
And see the binding to which we restrict ourselves
Slacken and burst like a bad bulwark-plank;
She had to see in the moving wake
Float and sink the death we gird upon ourselves,
And see flow the blood with which we dye
Our lustral robe and our childishness;
She had to see by a play of mirage
Recede the fixed goal that we attain,
And see the term at which we rejoin each other
Steal away from us in mid-landing;
She had to see in the very heart of the storm
Burn the dear flame that we extinguish
And see the evils that we adjoin to ourselves
Lie down against us for a noble servitude;
She had to see in all this scrawling
Stiffen the duties we enjoin upon ourselves,
And the sharp cares with which we prick ourselves
Pierce us to the heart in all this daubing:
That she might see come from the depth of the countryside,
In the midst of her clerks, in the midst of her pages,
Toward the Roman arena and the steep mountain,
Dragging the three Virtues at the pace of the train,
Her finest and firmest and gentlest companion
And the most beautiful child of her long patronages.