Looking upon my Venice and the stars
There stood one by me and his long cool hands
On mine were layed as in the times before.
Wherefor this question rose which I set forth.
Whether ’twere better, forge of thine own soul
Thy hand-wrought image in the things of earth,
Or were it better in a gentler fashion
Weighing man’s song by other signs of worth
To hover astral o’er some other soul
And breathe upon it thine own outpouring passion
Of how this line were wrought or how from chaos
The God outwrought the sprinkled dust of stars
Or say what blending
Of hue on hue on hue would make the ending
Of such a sketch or such show how the night
Is cavernous and dark and how deep hollows
Behind the veil of shade grow luminous
If eye but knew the secret there indwelling.
•
Or sing strange runes past this my pen’s faint telling,
Recondite chaunting of the ways unknown,
Of how the fields more fair are “in that country,”
And how the Truths stand visible and whole
—Platon hath seen them thus,
we know who dream—
Whether ’twere better, with one’s own hand to fashion
One lone man’s mirroring upon the sand
Or were it better in the air to glide
From heart to heart and fill each heart with passion
To see, and make, and know what truths abide.
Una pax tibi, let the dream abide.