Poetry for the Last Week of Advent: The O Antiphons - Part IV

O Clavis David (O Key of David)

The O Antiphon for today is again based on the words from Isaiah, referring to David, and to the Messiah to come, who would descend from David and be the Key to the Kingdom of God (see also Revelations 3:7-12).

I will place on his shoulder the key of the house of David; he shall open, and no one shall shut; he shall shut, and no one shall open. -- Isaiah 22:22

...to open eyes that are blind, to free captives from prison and to release from the dungeon those who sit in darkness. -- Isaiah 44:7

And now the sonnet written by priest and poet Malcolm Guite:

O Clavis

Even in the darkness where I sit

And huddle in the midst of misery

I can remember freedom, but forget

That every lock must answer to a key,

That each dark clasp, sharp and intricate,

Must find a counter-clasp to meet its guard,

Particular, exact and intimate,

The clutch and catch that meshes with its ward.

I cry out for the key I threw away

That turned and over turned with certain touch

And with the lovely lifting of a latch

Opened my darkness to the light of day.

O come again, come quickly, set me free

Cut to the quick to fit, the master key.

-- Malcolm Guite, Sounding the Seasons, Canterbury Press, 2012

Once again, to hear the Antiphon chanted in English, the poem read by the poet, and the Antiphon chanted again in Latin, click HERE.