This radiant pomp of sun and star, It cannot be, I will look again. Surely now will the curtain rise, And Nature has miscarried wholly Alas! thine is the bankruptcy, I Come, lay thee in my soothing shade, I will be thy companion. Quit thy friends as the dead in doom, And the bell of beetle and of bee That flows in streams, that breathes in wind: Leave all thy pedant lore apart; God hid the whole world in thy heart. Love shuns the sage, the child it crowns, The rain comes when the wind calls; Oft didst thou thread the woods in vain • Hearken once more! I will tell thee the mundane lore. From the heart of God proceeds, A single will, a million deeds. Once slept the world an egg of stone, And pulse, and sound, and light was none; And God said, "Throb!" and there was motion Who layeth the world's incessant plan, But forever doth escape, "Like wave or flame, into new forms Pouring of his power the wine The world is the ring of his spells, And the play of his miracles. As he giveth to all to drink, Thus or thus they are and think. The third adds heat's indulgent spark; The fourth gives light which eats the dark; Into the fifth himself he flings, And conscious Law is King of kings.1 Or the stars of eternity? Alike to him the better, the worse, The glowing angel, the outcast corse. He is the sparkle of the spar; He is the heart of every creature ; Than all it holds more deep, more high.' " MONADNOC THOUSAND minstrels woke within me, Up! If thou knew'st who calls To twilight parks of beech and pine, O'erlooks the surging landscape's swell! Let not unto the stones the Day Her lily and rose, her sea and land display. Read the celestial sign! Lo! the south answers to the north; A greater spirit bids thee forth Than the gray dreams which thee detain. Beckon thee to their arcades; Youth, for a moment free as they, Teach thy feet to feel the ground, Ere yet arrives the wintry day When Time thy feet has bound. |