A Vision of Resurrection.
THE genius of an hour that fading Day Resigned to wide-haired Night's impending brow Stole me apart, I knew not where nor how, And from my sense ravished the world away. Rose in my view a visionary ground, A rugged plain, beneath uncoloured skies. There slowly in the midst without a sound Upheaved a motion as of birth. I gazed, When lo! a head, with upcast, empty eyes And semblance of dead shoulders' majesties, Whose fleshless arms a marble breast upraised.
But even as this emerged, nor yet was free, Behold it ripen into bloom and form,
The shrunk limbs round and into colour warm, The hair spring new as leaves upon a tree,
And curl like small flames round the forehead fair.
At last the eyelids open wide: it seems
A glorious-statured youth that wakens there, Casting his eyes in wonder down, to feel This body that with clear blood newly teems, How perfect, yet still heavy as from dreams, And over it the ancient beauty steal.
O lost in musing recollection sweet,
What summoning cry thine age-long slumber stirred? In that profound grave has thy cold ear heard
From heaven the mailed Archangel call, whose feet
Stand planted in the stream of stars, and whose Time-shattering trump hath pealed to the world's
Yet still doth thy averted head refuse
To lift its eyes up; still thy spread hands lean On earth, while pensive thou surveyest o'er This radiant shape that all thy sorrows bore, Strong now as if no pain had ever been.
What thoughts begin to glide upon thy brain, And part thy lips with sighs? Is it some fear 'Mid flattering heavenly airs approaching near This strange unproven peace to entertain? Musing, "O rebel flesh, in my hard need How often didst thou fail me! I know well How thou didst make me suffer, toil, and bleed, At once my prison and my enemy.
Dear body, I fear thee yet: dark rages dwell Within thee: how shalt thou in peace excel? How learn to bear perfect felicity?"
Nay, rather that fond wonder in thy look Is wonder to have lost the thoughts that maim, The wounds of evilly-invented shame
And fear that each sweet impulse overtook. Now thou art free, and, all thy being whole, Perceivest in that peril-haunted earth The fair and primal gestures of thy soul, And knowest how all thy full completion fed, The urging hungers, the sun-sweetened mirth; Yea, finding even in those furies worth, Which lacking, hardly art thou perfected.
What trees are these whose dim young branches rise Above thee? Springing waters freshen sweet New tender green for thee to pace and greet The growing of the dawn of Paradise.
Thou gazest round thee with a listening face, Hearkening perhaps to some far-floating song Unheard of men. Ah, go not ere thy grace, O glorified, of me be throughly learned!
But as I prayed in supplication strong The vision faded, and the world, whose wrong Mocks holy beauty and our desire, returned.
LONELY, save for a few faint stars, the sky Dreams; and lonely, below, the little street Into its gloom retires, secluded and shy.
Scarcely the dumb roar enters this soft retreat; And all is dark, save where come flooding rays From a tavern window: there, to the brisk measure Of an organ that down in an alley merrily plays, Two children, all alone and no one by,
Holding their tattered frocks, through an airy maze Of motion, lightly threaded with nimble feet, Dance sedately: face to face they gaze,
Their eyes shining, grave with a perfect pleasure.
LIFE from sunned peak, witched wood and flowery dell
A hundred ways the eager spirit wooes, To roam, to dream, to conquer, to rebel; Yet in its ear a voice cries ever, Choose!
So many ways, yet only one shall find: So many joys, yet only one shall bless; So many creeds, yet to each pilgrim mind One road to the divine forgetfulness.
Tongues talk of truth; but truth is only found Where the heart runs to be poured utterly, Like streams whose home is in their motion, bound To follow one faith and in that be free.
O love, since I have found one truth so true, Let me lose all, to lose my loss in you.
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