That Life’s dank weeds, might flowers bloom.

’Tis on the scroll, graved deep, that I now pay,

And Life must quaff the poison’d wine;

But Love and Hope, if star-strewn on the way,

Can purify the living vine.

O Soul, the tallied years of men count not,

For life eternal sweepeth back;

As life unending is predestined lot,

And I am I, from love, from rack!

This vibrant flame, entombed in human clay,