OPEN GATE

 O Christ, who holds the open gate

O Christ, who holds the open gate,
O Christ who drives the furrow straight,
O Christ, the plow, O Christ, the laughter
of holy white birds flying after.

Lo, all my heart's field red and torn,
and thou wilt bring the young green corn,
the young green corn divinely springing,
the young green corn for ever singing.

And when the field is fresh and fair
thy blessèd feet shall glitter there,
and we will walk the weeded field,
and tell the golden harvest's yield.

The corn that makes the holy bread
by which the soul of man is fed,
the holy bread, the food unpriced,
thy everlasting mercy, O Christ. 

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https://artandtheology.org/2016/02/01/excerpts-from-the-everlasting-mercy-by-john-masefield/

In 1911 he wrote “The Everlasting Mercy,” a long poem that tells the tale of a man’s conversion from a life of sin to life in Christ. Masefield takes us down into the darkness felt by the poem’s antihero and speaker, Saul Kane—a belligerent drunk and a womanizer—and then up into the light he experiences when, in his own words, “the Lord took pity on me” and “brought me into grace.” The bulk of the poem takes place during one of Saul’s drinking binges:

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https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2009/4-december/faith/christ-holds-the-open-gate

JOHN MASEFIELD’s narrative poem The Everlasting Mercy (1911) is the searing tale of Saul Kane, a young reprobate who ultimately finds re­demption through Christ. His life is a playing out of the four great Advent themes of hell, death, judge­ment, and heaven. Lord Alfred Douglas called it “nine-tenths sheer filth”. It was denounced from pulpits, avidly recited in pubs, and hailed by J. M. Barrie as “incom­parably the finest literature”.