With giant march from floor to roof
Rose the full notes, now parted off
In pauses massively aloof
Like measured thunders, now rejoined
In concords of mysterious kind
Which fused together sense and mind,
Now flashing sharp on sharp along
Exultant in a mounting throng,
Now dying off to a low song
Fed upon minors, wavelike sounds
Re-eddying into silver rounds,
Enlarging liberty with bounds:
And every rhythm that seemed to close
Survived in confluent underflows
Symphonious with the next that rose.
Thus the whole strain being multiplied
And greatened, with its glorified
Wings shot abroad from side to side,
Waved backward (as a wind might wave
A Brocken mist and with as brave
Wild roaring) arch and architrave,
Aisle, transept, column, marble wall,—
Then swelling outward, prodigal
Of aspiration beyond thrall,
Soared, and drew up with it the whole
Of this said vision, as a soul
Is raised by a thought. And as a scroll
Of bright devices is unrolled
Still upward with a gradual gold,
So rose the vision manifold,