Last Thursday, I left for a Celebration of Life/aka a funeral and in my general stress forgot to post this on Friday. Enjoy it now.

Longfellow wrote six sonnets on Dante and Italy, and cathedrals where he thought about Dante. This one (number five) is remarkably Eucharistic.

V

I Lift mine eyes, and all the windows blaze
    With forms of saints and holy men who died,
    Here martyred and hereafter glorified;
    And the great Rose upon its leaves displays
Christ’s Triumph, and the angelic roundelays,
    With splendor upon splendor multiplied;
    And Beatrice again at Dante’s side
    No more rebukes, but smiles her words of praise.
And then the organ sounds, and unseen choirs
    Sing the old Latin hymns of peace and love
    And benedictions of the Holy Ghost;
And the melodious bells among the spires
    O’er all the house-tops and through heaven above
    Proclaim the elevation of the Host!