WHO shall tell what did befall, Far away in time, when once, Over the lifeless ball,
Hung idle stars and suns?
What god the element obeyed?
Wings of what wind the lichen bore, Wafting the puny seeds of power, Which, lodged in rock, the rock abrade? And well the primal pioneer
Knew the strong task to it assigned, Patient through Heaven's enormous year To build in matter home for mind. From air the creeping centuries drew The matted thicket low and wide, This must the leaves of ages strew The granite slab to clothe and hide, Ere wheat can wave its golden pride. What smiths, and in what furnace, rolled (In dizzy æons dim and mute
The reeling brain can ill compute)
Copper and iron, lead and gold ?
What oldest star the fame can save Of races perishing to pave
The planet with a floor of lime?
Dust is their pyramid and mole:
Who saw what ferns and palms were pressed Under the tumbling mountain's breast, In the safe herbal of the coal?
But when the quarried means were piled, All is waste and worthless, till Arrives the wise selecting will, And, out of slime and chaos, Wit Draws the threads of fair and fit. Then temples rose, and towns, and marts, The shop of toil, the hall of arts; Then flew the sail across the seas To feed the North from tropic trees; The storm-wind wove, the torrent span, Where they were bid the rivers ran; New slaves fulfilled the poet's dream, Galvanic wire, strong-shouldered steam.
Then docks were built, and crops were stored, And ingots added to the hoard.
But, though light-headed man forget, Remembering Matter pays her debt:
Still, through her motes and masses, draw
Electric thrills and ties of Law,
Which bind the strength of Nature wild To the conscience of a child.
DAUGHTERS of Time, the hypocritic Days, Muffled and dumb like barefoot dervishes, And marching single in an endless file, Bring diadems and fagots in their hands. To each they offer gifts after his will, Bread, kingdoms, stars, and sky that holds them all. I, in my pleachéd garden, watched the pomp, Forgot my morning wishes, hastily
Took a few herbs and apples, and the Day Turned and departed silent. I, too late, Under her solemn fillet saw the scorn.
Ir I could put my woods in song, And tell what's there enjoyed,
All men would to my gardens throng, And leave the cities void.
In my plot no tulips blow, Snow-loving pines and oaks instead; And rank the savage maples grow From spring's faint flush to autumn red.
My garden is a forest ledge
Which older forests bound;
The banks slope down to the blue lake-edge, Then plunge to depths profound.
Here once the Deluge ploughed, Laid the terraces, one by one; Ebbing later whence it flowed, They bleach and dry in the sun.
The sowers made haste to depart, - The wind and the birds which sowed it; Not for fame, nor by rules of art, Planted these, and tempests flowed it.
Waters that wash my garden side Play not in Nature's lawful web, They heed not moon or solar tide, - Five years elapse from flood to ebb.
Hither hasted, in old time, Jove, And every god, -none did refuse; And be sure at last came Love, And after Love, the Muse.
Keen ears can catch a syllable, As if one spake to another,
In the hemlocks tall, untamable,
And what the whispering grasses smother.
Eolian harps in the pine
Ring with the song of the Fates;
Infant Bacchus in the vine,
Far distant yet his chorus waits.
Canst thou copy in verse one chime Of the wood-bell's peal and cry, Write in a book the morning's prime, Or match with words that tender sky?
Wonderful verse of the gods, Of one import, of varied tone; They chant the bliss of their abodes To man imprisoned in his own.
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