{
 "id": "ameen-rihani/god-of-the-distances-hear-us",
 "title": "God of the Distances, Hear Us",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Ameen Rihani",
 "poet_slug": "ameen-rihani",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "A Chant of Mystics and Other Poems",
 "book_slug": "a-chant-of-mystics-and-other-poems",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 19,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1921,
  "venue": "A Chant of Mystics and Other Poems (1921)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/chantofmysticsot00riha"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/ameen-rihani_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Myrtle_and_Myrrh",
   "https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/A_Chant_of_Mystics_and_Other_Poems",
   "https://archive.org/details/myrtlemyrrhpoems00riha",
   "https://archive.org/details/chantofmysticsot00riha"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 99,
  "n_stanzas": 4,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 50,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "God of the Distances, hear us⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hear us and guide us today.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy footsteps, though never so near us,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Are lost in the dust of the fray.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy high priests, who often have spoken",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The word that was heeded, are mute;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their torch is extinguished; their token",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Is distrust and discord and dispute.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "God of the Distances, never",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Was man, though still fettered, so free",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To challenge his star and to sever",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Himself from the past and from thee.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But we, though our spirit is broken,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We heed thee again and anon;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We trust thee, O God, though thy token",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Be the desert, thy promise, the sun.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Forever the Distances call us⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The Distances veiled of the Dream;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And we come, whatsoever befall us,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Our pledges and thine to redeem.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We come; and though often we altered",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Our course at the gates of dismay,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We never looked backward or faltered,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Never regretted our way.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "God of the Distances, hear us⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hear us and guide us today.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "From the cave of the first Dream we wandered",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Through the forests of Fate and of Chance;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And on many an illusion we squandered",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The treasures of Faith and Romance.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We fared with the Fairies of noontide,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We roved with the Jinn of the night;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Our high priests we left on the wayside,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Our prophets we lost on the height",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of rebellion recurrent. We passed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Many a temple and shrine,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where the sherds of old creeds were recast",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And traded as tokens divine.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We passed them, forever consoled",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And cajoled by the Voice⁠—“ ’T is the way",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of your goal; your forebodings allay.”",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But thousands of cycles we told,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Millions of leagues we unrolled,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Heedless of Time and his sway.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "God of the visions of old,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hear us and guide us today.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "We sailed all the Seas of the Mind,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We rounded the Capes of the Soul,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We crossed all the Channels that roll",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Over the dead of our kind.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And on many a beckoning strand,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Furrowed with silvery streams,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We lingered, but lo, in the land",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Were the desolate gardens of dreams.⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Onward! the sails of Desire,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Born of the Distances’ fire,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Tattered but ever unfurled,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To worlds undiscovered aspire⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To the life-giving worlds of our world.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Onward! though no signs appear",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where once rose the phares of the Seer",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the Prophet. On, on! to the goal,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Though veiled in the billows that roll",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Over Orion.⁠—The fear",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of the Distances never was liege",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of our hearts; but the Mazes besiege",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The bridges of Faith on our way.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "God of our vision austere,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hear us and guide us today.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Hear us the Captains of Sorrow⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The tillers of the soil of defeat⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The lights of the oft promised morrow,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whose false dawns thy promise repeat.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Our name and our purpose are written",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In blood on the tablets of Time;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Our spirit, though frequently smitten",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To the dust, has arisen, sublime",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And triumphant, again and again;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Our torch, though extinguished, was never",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Relinquished; our sword and our pen",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Are brandished forever and ever.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Yea, the Ideal’s undying desire",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the wreaths of defeat it has won,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their story, in letters of fire,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Is limned on the brow of the sun.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And not till a new world ’s begotten",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of the womb of our own, will the word",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of the soul of the earth be forgotten,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or the cry of the earth be unheard.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "’T is our word, ’t is our cry, ’t is our yearning,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which shall mark even the ending of Time;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For no cycle of darkness returning",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Shall reach to the path we must climb,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or efface from our sight the supernal",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Beauty of Truth born of Dream.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "God of the vision eternal,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We are thine, though in darkness we seem,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But hear us, O hear us today",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And help us again to our way.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}