The Salutation -- Thomas Traherne

Guest poem sent in by K J Lee

(Poem #1390) The Salutation These little Limbs, These Eys and Hands which here I find, This panting Heart wherwith my Life begins; Where have ye been? Behind What Curtain were ye from me hid so long! Where was, in what Abyss, my new-made Tongue? When silent I So many thousand thousand Years Beneath the Dust did in a Chaos ly, How could I Smiles, or Tears, Or Lips, or Hands, or Eys, or Ears perceiv? Welcom ye Treasures which I now receiv. I that so long Was Nothing from Eternity, Did little think such Joys as Ear and Tongue To celebrat or see: Such Sounds to hear, such Hands to feel, such Feet, Beneath the Skies, on such a Ground to meet. New burnisht Joys! Which finest Gold and Pearl excell! Such sacred Treasures are the Limbs of Boys In which a Soul doth dwell: Their organized Joints and azure Veins More Wealth include than all the World contains. From Dust I rise And out of Nothing now awake; These brighter Regions which salute mine Eys A Gift from God I take: The Earth, the Seas, the Light, the lofty Skies, The Sun and Stars are mine; if these I prize. A Stranger here, Strange things doth meet, strange Glory see, Strange Treasures lodg'd in this fair World appear, Strange all and New to me: But that they mine should be who Nothing was, That Strangest is of all; yet brought to pass. -- Thomas Traherne

Nobody does the joy of being more than Traherne. Almost all his poems are
to do with the miracle of existence, the wonder of our universe, and the
sheer extraordinariness of ordinary things. This particular poem never
fails to make me grateful to be alive, not just for all the things
Traherne mentions, but also the near perfection of this poem, with its
changing rhythms which delay then resolve the rhymes.

At the risk of being over-analytical with such a passionate piece of
verse, I particularly like the second stanza: ears alliterates with eyes
and rhymes with tears, and many a lesser poet would have left it there to
end the line, but Traherne makes the 4th line a pentameter - perceive!
which then chimes nicely with the last line, also a pentameter with the
same rhyme. This is wisdom and flawless poetry - Traherne is saying that
the world we live in is not a trifle, but a subject for solemn
amazement, and deserves nothing less.

With regard to Traherne's poetry, we are doubly-blessed, because this and
other beautiful poems by him have been set to music in another great work,
the "Dies Natalis" by Gerald Finzi (1901-1956). Finzi is little-known
outside the United Kingdom, but his settings of English verse,
particularly Shakespeare and Hardy, are glorious and well-loved.

Regards
Kuan

[Biography]

Thomas Traherne, was born in Hereford, near the Welsh border, in 1637, and
died in 1674. A biography can be found at
  http://www.bartleby.com/65/tr/Traherne.html