“The expense is reckoned, the enterprise is begun; it is of God, it cannot be withstood. So the Faith was planted: so it must be restored.” – St. Edmund Campion

***

I am the teacher whose lessons you scorn,

As I beg you to remember the glories of old,

When the Cross was planted on Kentish soil

And kings exchanged their crowns for thorns.

That day, Angles became angels,

But what are we now? Tell me!

Land of Crosses, thou martyred isle,

England, look up! What hast thou become?

Harlot draped in scarlet, sacrificing thy sons

To the idol of thine own image!

No treason against thee have I committed,

Save my firmness in the faith of my fathers,

Of thy fathers, who thou condemn alike in me!

My wounds mouth words, spilling upon wood,

As rain mixes with blood from my butchery,

Streaming down Tyburn’s sacred altar

Which I once saluted for its criss-cross beams.

The reddened mud of London’s streets

Stains the shoes of the onlookers

And splatters upon their clothing,

Never to be washed clean.

My God, may it prove their salvation!

My father sold books here, in our city,

While I honed speeches in Oxford’s halls,

A youth, fallen in love with ink, 

Unaware blood would be demanded.

The Virgin Queen patronized me,

And her favorites favored me,

For I had a keen mind and a candied tongue.

Yet I became an exile, an outlaw,

A priest, reconciled to Rome at my peril,

And I journeyed back again

To this, my native realm, as a pilgrim,

Under feigned name in false garb,

With jewels, salvaged from the shipwreck,

For my country has scuttled her own origin

On the rocks of apostacy.

I ride from shire to shire,

Saying mass, pardoning sins,

Bragging, so they claim,

With fresh ink on forbidden presses.

I am a merchant of forbidden goods,

Denied a debate, condemned for my candor,

With Te Deum yet upon my tongue,

Though my hand trembles from torture.

They pulled me forth from a hole,

As if it were a womb, another birth

Into Anglia, and Aeternitas.

I toast my betrayer, who brought me to this end,

And pray for the queen whose subject I remain.

I was brought before Eliza Regina,

Offered my life, with riches, if I would relent,

But I refused to surrender my Treasure,

For I am Edmund, Defender of Wealth,

Named for this kingdom’s first patron,

A king slaughtered by heathens, 

A corpse safeguarded by wolves,

Whose shrine was desecrated

By his devotees’ degenerate descendents.

How can I expect better?

Like him, I follow Christ,

Who gave us this example.

I commend myself, and all mankind,

To Him, who searches our hearts

And sends us His grace.

Jesu, Jesu, convert England…

May it be, may it be!

So the faith was planted;

So it must be restored!

Oh, England, we have loved thee so well!

We have given thee our hearts,

Torn from our breasts!

We have given thee our heads,

Raised high upon thy pikes!

Oh, we have loved thee 

As well as any son of thine might

Without despising God,

That we might win thee Heaven,

Or have done with Earth!

My words will endure

Though the multitudes go deaf.

Listen for the echo, children of these latter days.

Learn from us, when they say ‘God is dead.’

It was not our death that ever we feared;

For this we came into the world.

Though my strength is emptied

And my appearance disfigured,

I shall be called the Diamond,

And I shall be called the Flower,

And I shall be called the Glory

Of England, Isle of Saints,

Mary’s dowry, yea, her daughter,

Most devoted child of the Holy See!

The Lady still stands in her niche,

High above the flying bricks,

And I salute her with my crippled hand,

The same one that siezed the lily

She extended to me in my dream.

Edmundus Campianus, Martyr.

Sic transit gloria mundi.

Dismissed by darkened generations,

You will remember me 

When your worldly gains are squandered,

And the scent of death hangs heavy

Over the debris of empire.

It is glory and gladness to me

That God lives, and posterity shall live,

Like the imprint of my face

Upon a pitying passerby’s towel.

Oh, England, Mother England,

When you are a stranger, even to yourself,

We will never despair of your recovery.

You will still have us,

Your martyrs,

When the wounds of the nation flow red

And your right hand withers.

You will have us, yet,

Your holy traitors,

For it is impossible to slay

What has already been slain.

There is only one thing left for us,

Only one thing left for you:

The Advent of Resurrection!