text
stringlengths 0
56
|
|---|
To dare. |
Adored with caution, as a brittle heaven, |
To reach |
Were hopeless as the rainbow's raiment |
To touch, |
Yet persevered toward, surer for the distance; |
How high |
Unto the saints' slow diligence |
The sky! |
Ungained, it may be, by a life's low venture, |
But then, |
Eternity enables the endeavoring |
Again. |
XXXVI. |
SIGHT. |
Before I got my eye put out, |
I liked as well to see |
As other creatures that have eyes, |
And know no other way. |
But were it told to me, to-day, |
That I might have the sky |
For mine, I tell you that my heart |
Would split, for size of me. |
The meadows mine, the mountains mine, -- |
All forests, stintless stars, |
As much of noon as I could take |
Between my finite eyes. |
The motions of the dipping birds, |
The lightning's jointed road, |
For mine to look at when I liked, -- |
The news would strike me dead! |
So safer, guess, with just my soul |
Upon the window-pane |
Where other creatures put their eyes, |
Incautious of the sun. |
XXXVII. |
Talk with prudence to a beggar |
Of 'Potosi' and the mines! |
Reverently to the hungry |
Of your viands and your wines! |
Cautious, hint to any captive |
You have passed enfranchised feet! |
Anecdotes of air in dungeons |
Have sometimes proved deadly sweet! |
XXXVIII. |
THE PREACHER. |
He preached upon "breadth" till it argued him narrow, -- |
The broad are too broad to define; |
And of "truth" until it proclaimed him a liar, -- |
The truth never flaunted a sign. |
Simplicity fled from his counterfeit presence |
As gold the pyrites would shun. |
What confusion would cover the innocent Jesus |
To meet so enabled a man! |
XXXIX. |
Good night! which put the candle out? |
A jealous zephyr, not a doubt. |
Ah! friend, you little knew |
How long at that celestial wick |
The angels labored diligent; |
Extinguished, now, for you! |
It might have been the lighthouse spark |
Some sailor, rowing in the dark, |
Had importuned to see! |
It might have been the waning lamp |
That lit the drummer from the camp |
To purer reveille! |