The pondered purpose or a dream that wrought,
By night, the murder of his waking thought,
Sustained him till he felt his strength returned.
And then at length the longed-for morning burned
And beckoned down the vast way he should crawl—
That waste to be surmounted as a wall,
Sky-rims and yet more sky-rims steep to climb—
That simulacrum of enduring Time—
The hundred empty miles ‘twixt him and where
The stark Missouri ran!