No human foot-print here before my own!

And it is strange to come so far—alone—

So far into this frozen forest world

Of moonlight and of shadow and deep snow,

And things I do not know,

That strike the civil vestments from my soul—

As if all law-born years were backward hurled

Toward some dim and other pole—

Some brute primordial reign

Whose voice was terror and whose life was pain.