Magnus Martyr then

“This music crept by me upon the waters”
And along the Strand, up Queen Victoria Street.
O City City, I can sometimes hear
Beside a public bar in Lower Thames Street,
The pleasant whining of a mandoline
And a clatter and a chatter from within
Where fishmen lounge at noon: where the walls
Of Magnus Martyr hold
Inexplicable splendour of Ionian white and gold.

What we have lost
or abandoned
can be sacralized in regret

"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which killest the prophets,
and stonest them that are sent unto thee;
how often would I have gathered thy children together,
as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings,
and ye would not!"

Yet what is lost, may be found
Abandoned, redeemed
In memory and more.

"Where should this music be? i' the air or the earth?
It sounds no more: and sure, it waits upon
Some god o' the island. Sitting on a bank,
Weeping again the king my father's wreck,
This music crept by me upon the waters,
Allaying both their fury and my passion
With its sweet air: thence I have follow'd it,
Or it hath drawn me rather. But 'tis gone.
No, it begins again."

Retrieving in joy
Restoring in love
Releasing the sacred from seclusion.

Magnus Martyr now