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| THE CERBERUS breakers that brawl and that cry, | |
| The sun and the sky with their Raphael eye, | |
| The skylarks that soar and the serpents that creep, | |
| The lilies that love and the willows that weep, | |
| The grandeurs of heaven, the glamours of earth, | 5 |
| In Thy outdoors, O God, they are singing Thy worth. | |
| And love and its wonder, the mother and child, | |
| The lullabies sweet, and the elegies wild, | |
| The sanctuary, Home, the spirit-realm’s pole, | |
| The Eden unlost, and the shrine of the soul, | 10 |
| In Thy indoors, O God, in the hearth we revere, | |
| In its tears, in its triumphs, Thy splendors appear. | |
| But leaving to heaven, the sun and the star, | |
| When we grope on the threshold and wait for the bar | |
| To slip, and the door of the home to unfold, | 15 |
| And see not the rising or sunsetting gold, | |
| While we grope on the threshold expectant and tense, | |
| All silent with fearful and hopeful suspense, | |
| Dumb lintel above us, blind doorstep, before, | |
| The heart, it is neither on ocean or shore, | 20 |
| What hint to the soul of the Master, what gleam, | |
| What clue to His labyrinth’s coil of dream? | |
| It is the Mezuzah, the doorpost uplifts, | |
| Enwrit with Thy statutes, Thy name and Thy gifts; | |
| Coat of Arms of the knighthood of God, like a spell, | 25 |
| The Mezuzah holds sentry where Israelites dwell. | |
| What heavenly romance, its blazonings seal, | |
| What lists, and what Galahads that harm not but heal. | |
| What Unity linking the shadow and sun, | |
| Till shadow and sunshine one glory have spun; | 30 |
| And it isn’t the parchment, the scroll or the case, | |
| It’s the charm of the Shaddai it bears on its face, | |
| And the mystical Shema inscribed in the scroll, | |
| We caress and we kiss. We are kissing its soul | |
| In crossing the threshold; O hearken, we pray, | 35 |
| “Heaven keep our going and coming each day.” | |
| And they tell, Belial, the demon of vice, | |
| In touching the threshold, must cease to entice. | |
| For the doorstep’s enchanted, the Mezuzah has charm | |
| To keep from the threshold the harpies that harm. | 40 |
| The Mezuzah’s the soul of the threshold, behold, | |
| It touched with enchantment and mystical gold, | |
| The portal: The threshold with witchcraft is shod, | |
| On the threshold and doorpost, we also see God! | |
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