Cold and cruel as the winds that carry
Arctic hills of ice and snow,
Past the cliffs where skirling sea-birds tarry
And the seething breakers flow.

Burning as the Afric wind that races
Northward from its desert land,
Wind that blasts and covers green oases
With its ropes of parching sand.

Rough and angry as the winds that bluster
Where Tibetan temples shine,
Winds like savage lancers come to muster
On an Eastern frontier line.

Sad and blind as winds that wander sobbing,
Where the raw Atlantic mist
From the stars their pearly radiance robbing,
Grips the shore with damp white fist.

So our souls from every quarter eddy,
North and South and East and West,
Jesu, till the wayward and the ready
On thy heart all sink to rest.