Trees, and Other Poems

St. Alexis

     Patron of Beggars

     We who beg for bread as we daily tread
      Country lane and city street,
     Let us kneel and pray on the broad highway
      To the saint with the vagrant feet.
     Our altar light is a buttercup bright,
      And our shrine is a bank of sod,
     But still we share St. Alexis' care,
      The Vagabond of God.

     They gave him a home in purple Rome
      And a princess for his bride,
     But he rowed away on his wedding day
      Down the Tiber's rushing tide.
     And he came to land on the Asian strand
      Where the heathen people dwell;
     As a beggar he strayed and he preached and prayed
      And he saved their souls from hell.

     Bowed with years and pain he came back again
      To his father's dwelling place.
     There was none to see who this tramp might be,
      For they knew not his bearded face.
     But his father said, "Give him drink and bread
      And a couch underneath the stair."
     So Alexis crept to his hole and slept.
      But he might not linger there.

     For when night came down on the seven-hilled town,
      And the emperor hurried in,
     Saying, "Lo, I hear that a saint is near
      Who will cleanse us of our sin,"
     Then they looked in vain where the saint had lain,
      For his soul had fled afar,
     From his fleshly home he had gone to roam
      Where the gold-paved highways are.

     We who beg for bread as we daily tread
      Country lane and city street,
     Let us kneel and pray on the broad highway
      To the saint with the vagrant feet.
     Our altar light is a buttercup bright,
      And our shrine is a bank of sod,
     But still we share St. Alexis' care,
      The Vagabond of God!