Leslie Nelson Jennings

WHEN people go to summon God

Unto his earthly throne,

The roof whereunder God may house

Must be a cry in stone.

For God, he will not hear a prayer

That lies against the ground—

How shall the worm lift up to God

So suppliant a sound?

How shall the birds who build so small

Be heard beneath the sky?—

Or those who have no mason’s hand

Be shriven with a cry?

Ten million spires of prayer there be

In Christendom today—

There is no God in Lisser Wood,

Or on the queen’s highway.

And I who cannot square a stone,

Or lodge beneath a roof,

Have heard strange horns on sundown hills

And seen the devil’s hoof!