Tabb Centenary Year X

Five quatrains by Rev. John B. Tabb.

Whisper

Close cleaving unto silence, into sound
   She ventures as a timorous child from land,
Still glancing, at each step, around,
   Lest suddenly she lose her sister’s hand.

September 1893 (p. 361, Quatrains: Miscellaneous)

Stilling the Tempest

’Twas all she could:—The gift that Nature gave,
   The torrent of her tresses, did she spill
Before His feet: and lo, the troubled wave
   Of passion heard His whisper, “Peace, be still!”

April 1895 (p. 362, Quatrains: Miscellaneous)

The Bubble

Why should I stay? Nor seed nor fruit have I.
   But, sprung at once to beauty’s perfect round,
   Nor loss, nor gain, nor change in me is found—
A life-complete in death-complete to die.

October 1891 (p. 358, Quatrains: Miscellaneous)

Sleep

What art thou, balmy sleep?
“Foam from the fragrant deep
Of silence, hither blown
From the hushed waves of tone.”

September 1892 (p. 360, Quatrains: Miscellaneous)

Silence

A sea wherein the rivers of all sound
   Their streams incessant pour,
But whence no tide returning e’er hath found
   An echo on the shore.

August 1894 (p. 364, Quatrains: Miscellaneous)

[“Stilling the Tempest”: the poem skillfully amalgamates the Gospel stories of the sinful woman washing the Lord’s feet with her hair, Luke 7:36-50, and of the Lord Jesus calming the waves, Mark 4:35-40.]

The references (page number and section) are to The Poetry of Father Tabb, ed. Francis A. Litz, Ph.D. (New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1928). All of Tabb's poems published here in the Father Tabb Centenary Year were originally published before 1923.

Biblical references link to the New Advent Bible comprising Bishop Challoner's edition of the Douay-Rheims Bible (English) and the Sixto-Clementine edition of the Vulgate (Latin), since they are the versions which Father Tabb would have used as a Catholic.

The year 2009 is the centenary of the death of Rev. John Banister Tabb, November 19, 1909.

Lane Core Jr. CIW P — Sun. 02/15/09 04:45:22 PM
Categorized as Father Tabb Centenary Year & Literary.