Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

And the sons of intellect,
And the souls of ample fate,
Who the Future's gates unbar,-
Minions of the Morning Star.
In his prowess he exults,
And the multitude insults.
His impatient looks devour
Oft the humble and the poor,
And, seeing his eye glare,
They drop their few pale flowers,
Gathered with hope to please,
Along the mountain towers,-
Lose courage, and despair.
He will never be gainsaid,-
Pitiless, will not be stayed;
His hot tyranny

Burns up every other tie.

Therefore comes an hour from Jove
Which his ruthless will defies.

And the dogs of Fate unties.

Shiver the palaces of glass;

Shrivel the rainbow-coloured walls,

Where in bright Art each god and sibyl dwelt,

Secure as in the zodiac's belt ;

And the galleries and halls,

Wherein every siren sung,

Like a meteor pass.

For this fortune wanted root
In the core of God's abysm,—
Was a weed of self and schism;
And ever the Dæmonic Love
Is the ancestor of wars,

And the parent of remorse.

III. THE CELESTIAL LOVE.

UT God said,

BUT

I will have a purer gift;

There is smoke in the flame;

New flowerets bring, new prayers uplift,

And love without a name.
Fond children, ye desire
To please each other well;
Another round, a higher,

Ye shall climb on the heavenly stair,
And selfish preference forbear;
And in right deserving,

And without a swerving
Each from your proper state,

Weave roses for your mate.

"Deep, deep are loving eyes, Flowed with naphtha fiery sweet; And the point is paradise

Where their glances meet:

Their reach shall yet be more profound,

And a vision without bound:

The axis of those eyes sun-clear
Be the axis of the sphere:

So shall the lights ye pour amain
Go, without check or intervals,
Through from the empyrean walls
Unto the same again.

Higher far into the pure realm,
Over sun and star,

Over the flickering Dæmon film,
Thou must mount for love;
Into vision where all form
In one only form dissolves;
In a region where the wheel,
On which all beings ride,

Visibly revolves;

Where the starred, eternal worm

Girds the world with bound and term;

Where unlike things are like;

Where good and ill,

And joy and moan,

Melt into one.

There Past, Present, Future, shoot
Triple blossoms from one root;
Substances at base divided,
In their summits are united ;
There the holy essence rolls,
One through separated souls;
And the sunny on sleeps,
Folding Nature in its deeps;
And every fair and every good,
Known in part, or known impure,
To men below,

In their archetypes endure.
The race of gods,

Or those we erring own,

Are shadows flitting up and down
In the still abodes.

The circles of that sea are laws

Which publish and which hide the cause.

Pray for a beam

Out of that sphere,

Thee to guide and to redeem.

O, what a load

Of care and toil,

By lying use bestowed,

From his shoulders falls who sees

The true astronomy,

The period of peace.

Counsel which the ages kept

Shall the well-born soul accept.

As the overhanging trees

Fill the lake with images—

As garment draws the garment's hem,

Men their fortunes bring with them.

By right or wrong,

Lands and goods go to the strong.
Property will brutely draw

Still to the proprietor;

Silver to silver creep and wind,
And kind to kind.

VOL. V.

F

Nor less the eternal poles
Of tendency distribute souls.
There need no vows to bind

Whom not each other seek, but find.
They give and take no pledge or oath-
Nature is the bond of both:

No prayer persuades, no flattery fawns-
Their noble meanings are their pawns.
Plain and cold is their address,
Power have they for tenderness;
And, so thoroughly is known
Each other's counsel by his own,
They can parley without meeting;
Need is none of forms of greeting;
They can well communicate
In their innermost estate;

When each the other shall avoid,
Shall each by each be most enjoyed.

Not with scarfs or perfumed gloves
Do these celebrate their loves;
Not by jewels, feasts, and savours,
Not by ribbons or by favours,
But by the sun-spark on the sea,
And the cloud-shadow on the lea,
The soothing lapse of morn to mirk,
And the cheerful round of work.
Their cords of love so public are,
They intertwine the farthest star:
The throbbing sea, the quaking earth,
Yield sympathy and signs of mirth;
Is none so high, so mean is none,
But feels and seals this union;
Even the fell Furies are appease
The good applaud, the lost are eased.

Love's hearts are faithful, but not fond,
Bound for the just, but not beyond;
Not glad, as the low-loving herd,
Of self in other still preferred,
But they have heartily designed
The benefit of broad mankind.

And they serve men austerely,
After their own genius, clearly,
Without a false humility;
For this is Love's nobility-
Not to scatter bread and gold,
Goods and raiment bought and sold;
But to hold fast his simple sense,
And speak the speech of innocence,
And with hand, and body, and blood,
To make his bosom-counsel good.
He that feeds men serveth few;
He serves all who dares be true.

THE APOLOGY.

HINK me not unkind and rude

TH

That I walk alone in grove and glen;

I go to the god of the wood

To fetch his word to men.

Tax not my sloth that I

Fold my arms beside the brook; Each cloud that floated in the sky Writes a letter in my book.

Chide me not, laborious band,
For the idle flowers I brought;

Every aster in my hand

Goes home loaded with a thought.

There was never mystery

But 'tis figured in the flowers;

Was never secret history

But birds tell it in the bowers.

One harvest from thy field

Homeward brought the oxen strong;

A second crop thine acres yield,
Which I gather in a song.

[ocr errors]
« AnteriorContinuar »