The puissant approaches of thy face,
And yet thy
radiant leash he feels.
Since the hunt o' the world begun,
Lashed with
terror, leashed with
longing,
The
mighty course is ever run;
Pricked with
terror, leashed with
longing,
Thy rein they love, and thy
rebuke they shun.
Since the hunt o' the world began,
With love that trembleth, fear that loveth,
Thou join'st the woman to the man;
And Life with Death
In obscure nuptials moveth,
Commingling alien, yet affin-ed breath.
Thou art the incarnated Light
Whose Sire is aboriginal, and beyond
Death and resurgence of our day and night;
From him is thy vicegerent wand
With double potence of the black and white.
Giver of Love, and Beauty, and Desire,
The
terror, and the
loveliness, and purging,
The deathfulness and lifefulness of fire!
Samson's riddling meanings merging
In thy twofold sceptre meet:
Out of thy minatory might,
Burning Lion, burning Lion,
Comes the honey of all sweet,
And out of thee, the eater, comes forth meat.
And though, by thine
alternate breath,
Every kiss thou dost inspire
Echoeth
Back from the windy vaultages of death;
Yet thy clear warranty above
Augurs the wings of death too must
Occult reverberations stir of love
Crescent and life incredible;
That even the kisses of the just
Go down not unresurgent to the dust.
Yea, not a kiss which I have given,
But shall tri-umph upon my lips in heaven,
Or cling a
shamefulfungus there in hell.
Know'st thou me not, O Sun? Yea, well
Thou know'st the ancient miracle,
The children know'st of Zeus and May;
And still thou teachest them, O splendent Brother,
To incarnate, the
antique way,
The truth which is their
heritage from their Sire
In sweet
disguise of flesh from their sweet Mother.
My fingers thou hast taught to con
Thy flame-chorded psalterion,
Till I can
translate into
mortal wire--
Till I can
translate passing well--
The
heavenly harping harmony,
Melodious, sealed, inaudible,
Which makes the dulcet psalter of the world's desire.
Thou
whisperest in the Moon's white ear,
And she does
whisper into mine,--
By night together, I and she--
With her
virgin voice divine,
The things I cannot half so
sweetly tell
As she can
sweetly speak, I
sweetly hear.
By her, the Woman, does Earth live, O Lord,
Yet she for Earth, and both in thee.
Light out of Light!
Resplendent and
prevailing Word
Of the Unheard!
Not unto thee, great Image, not to thee
Did the wise
heathen bend an idle knee;
And in an age of faith grown frore
If I too shall adore,
Be it accounted unto me
A bright sciential idolatry!
God has given thee
visiblethunders
To utter thine apocalypse of wonders;
And what want I of prophecy,
That at the sounding from thy station
Of thy flagrant
trumpet, see
The seals that melt, the open revelation?
Or who a God-persuading angel needs,
That only heeds
The
rhetoric of thy burning deeds?
Which but to sing, if it may be,
In worship-warranting moiety,
So I would win
In such a song as hath within
A smouldering core of mystery,
Brimm-ed with nimbler meanings up
Than hasty Gideons in their hands may sup;--
Lo, my suit pleads
That thou, Isaian coal of fire,
Touch from yon altar my poor mouth's desire,
And the relucent song take for thy
sacred meeds.
To thine own shape
Thou round'st the chrysolite of the grape,
Bind'st thy gold lightnings in his veins;
Thou storest the white garners of the rains.
Destroyer and preserver, thou
Who medicinest
sickness, and to health
Art the unthank-ed
marrow of its wealth;
To those
apparent sovereignties we bow
And bright appurtenances of thy brow!
Thy proper blood dost thou not give,
That Earth, the gusty Maenad, drink and dance?
Art thou not life of them that live?
Yea, in glad twinkling
advent, thou dost dwell
Within our body as a tabernacle!
Thou bittest with thine ordinance
The jaws of Time, and thou dost mete
The unsustainable treading of his feet.
Thou to thy spousal universe
Art Husband, she thy Wife and Church;
Who in most dusk and vidual curch,
Her Lord being hence,
Keeps her cold sorrows by thy hearse.
The heavens renew their innocence
And morning state
But by thy sacrament communicate:
Their
weeping night the
symbol of our prayers,
Our darkened search,
And sinful vigil desolate.
Yea, biune in imploring dumb,
Essential Heavens and
corporal Earth await,
The Spirit and the Bride say: Come!
Lo, of thy Magians I the least
Haste with my gold, my incenses and myrrhs,
To thy desired epiphany, from the spiced
Regions and odorous of Song's traded East.
Thou, for the life of all that live
The
victim daily born and sacrificed;
To whom the
pinion of this
longing verse
Beats but with fire which first thyself did give,
To thee, O Sun--or is't
perchance, to Christ?
Ay, if men say that on all high heaven's face
The saintly signs I trace
Which round my stol-ed altars hold their
solemn place,
Amen, amen! For oh, how could it be,--
When I with wing-ed feet had run
Through all the windy earth about,
Quested its secret of the sun,
And heard what thing the stars together shout,--
I should not heed thereout
Consenting
counsel won:-
'By this, O Singer, know we if thou see.
When men shall say to thee: Lo! Christ is here,
When men shall say to thee: Lo! Christ is there,
Believe them: yea, and this--then art thou seer,
When all thy crying clear
Is but: Lo here! lo there!--ah me, lo everywhere!'
{1} The earth.
NEW YEAR'S CHIMES.
What is the song the stars sing?
(And a million songs are as song of one.)
This is the song the stars sing:
Sweeter song's none.
One to set, and many to sing,
(And a million songs are as song of one),
One to stand, and many to cling,
The many things, and the one Thing,
The one that runs not, the many that run.
The ever new weaveth the ever old
(And a million songs are as song of one).
Ever telling the never told;
The silver saith, and the said is gold,
And done ever the never done.
The chase that's chased is the Lord o' the chase
(And a million songs are as song of one),
And the pursued cries on the race;
And the hounds in leash are the hounds that run.
Hidden stars by the shown stars' sheen;
(And a million suns are but as one);
Colours
unseen by the colours seen,
And sounds unheard heard sounds between,
And a night is in the light of the sun.
An ambuscade of light in night,
(And a million secrets are but as one),
And a night is dark in the sun's light,
And a world in the world man looks upon.
Hidden stars by the shown stars' wings,
(And a million cycles are but as one),
And a world with un
apparent strings
Knits the simulant world of things;
Behold, and
vision thereof is none.
The world above in the world below
(And a million worlds are but as one),
And the One in all; as the sun's strength so
Strives in all strength, glows in all glow
Of the earth that wits not, and man thereon.
Braced in its own fourfold embrace
(And a million strengths are as strength of one),
And round it all God's arms of grace,
The world, so as the Vision says,
Doth with great lightning-tramples run.
And
thunder bruiteth into
thunder,
(And a million sounds are as sound of one),
From stellate peak to peak is tossed a voice of wonder,
And the
height stoops down to the depths thereunder,
And sun leans forth to his brother-sun.
And the more ample years unfold
(With a million songs as song of one),
A little new of the ever old,
A little told of the never told,
Added act of the never done.