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For very many years the good Shepherd's apt words and prompt deeds have been summoning His flock out of that dangerous meadow where they were bewildered, lost, up onto the safe lovely mountain top. There we see the blows, cross He bore, and grasp how deep His passion--nails, spiny thorns, His gems, spangled with spilling watery blood, the fountain whence he feeds us, sustains, enacts God's will-- fleeting grief endlessly washing away, obliterating long-endured evil. A ray of His light would melt the frost but that hard wax, dense shadowy clouds, a great rock all lie between God and the pressed-in heart. |
An image of the Italian text from Visconti's 1840 edition |
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Notes: From V LXVIII:228. See also B S1:56:113; MSs L and V2; Valgrisi 56. Interesting commentary by Mazzetti, 80. A seventh in a series meditating Christ. Key |
