What can it profit a man tho' he have the soul of a god
Sunk in the form of a beast, with a senseless simian face—
What can the world perceive of the subtler inward grace
Breathing upon the dust of the coarse clay clod?
What knows the world of me—the Me that is prisoned within—
Seeing only the self that sickens its sensitive eyes—
How can it know that this hateful mask hides not the sneer of Sin,
That this cloak of crass, crude flesh, is a trusty soul's disguise?
What can I hope to win? Which of the gifts men prize?
What can I have or hold of the bounteous boon I crave—
I, with the coarse stubbed hands, the dull and narrow eyes,
The low-browed leer of the brutal, base-born slave?
What can I know of Love? I, with my ape-like face,
Frighting the tender trust of the timorous, shrinking maid,
Who, drawn by my deep soul's spell, half-yields to the soul's embrace
Then looks on its hideous mask and trembles and flees dismayed.
Yet must the soul of fire chained to this cursed clay,
Galled by its fetters of flesh, seared with a thousand scars,
Shriek and struggle and beat its breast on its prison bars
Thro' the night's long dark of despair till the dawning of ultimate day,
Till the glow of that ultimate dawn transfigure the tortured face
And the sacred fire within crumble the coarse clay clod.
Till the Soul, breathed on by an unseen, unknown Grace,
Stripped of its bonds of flesh, stand face to face with its God!
To a Singer
Beneath thy Midas touch life's sullen grays
Are thrilled to sudden gold; as some far gleam
From wings of Helios athwart thy dream
Irradiates for thee earth's darksome ways.
Wild woodland voices ripple thro' thy lays;
Sweet silvern murmurs from some deep-delled spring,
Brook, tree and flower and each insensate thing,
The throstle's call, the calm of sun-steeped days,
A glint of sunshine on the swallow's wing,
Fern-filagrees, the drowsy drone of bee
Made drunk with draughts of purple wild-grape wine;
All these Orphèan music holds for thee,
And all thy days and dreams companioning
Walks Nature with her hand close-clasped in thine.
Blossom of Brine
Morn! and a white sail winging
Over the sunlit waves;
A song on the breezes ringing
Up from the coral caves
Where sea-nymphs, white arms lifting
Wreaths for the sea-god twine
Of the frail foam-flowers drifting
On the wave-crests—blossom of brine.