Poem for Mary

Thoughts for the Month of Mary


It is noon.
I see the church open,
and I must enter.

Mother of Jesus Christ,
I do not come to pray.
I have nothing to offer
and nothing to request.

I come solely to gaze on you,
O Mother.
To gaze on you,
weep for joy.
and know this:
that I am your child
and you are there.

I come only for a moment
while everything is at a standstill,
at noon!

Just to be with you,
O Mary,
in this place where you are.
Not to say anything
but to gaze at your countenance,
and let the heart sing
in its own language;
not to say anything
but solely to sing
because my heart is overflowing.

For you are beautiful,
because you are Immaculate,
the woman fully restored in Grace,
the creature in its first honor
and its final bloom,
as it issued from God
on the morn of its original splendor

You are ineffably intact,
because you are the Mother of Jesus Christ,
Who is the Truth in your arms,
and the only hope and the sole fruit.

by Paul Claudel
taken from Magnificat, May 2010 Issue


Paul Claudel (d.1955) was a poet, a playwright, a diplomat, and a member of the French Academy.