The Binnacle

The Church’s compass, if you please,
Has two or three (or more) degrees
    Of variation;
And many a soul has gone to grief
On this or that or t’other reef
Through faith unreckoning or brief
    Miscalculation.
Misguidance is of perils chief
    To navigation.

The obsequious thing makes, too, you’ll mark,
Obeisance through a little arc
    Of declination;
For Satan, fearing witches, drew
From Death’s pale horse, one day, a shoe,
And nailed it to his door to undo
    Their machination.
Since then the needle dips to woo
    His habitation.