uperbest power with sweetness wed
The inner eye doth overspread,
And vasts of nature blend as beauty
Suffused with awe at the Fountain Head.
The stream of power that floweth here
I see in pageant of the year,
Aye shimmering as light and shadow—
A wonderment on the verge of fear!
The world's not dead but animate,
And gives as free to mean as great;
Wealth of true power is not a kingdom
Of time and place, but the soul's estate.
bove the scarred cliff's iron brow
There speeds the fruitful crooked plow;
While on the soft west wind come odors
Of plumy pine and of balsam bough.
Here at the base another sight—
It ceaseth not by day nor night—
Ormudz and Ahriman contending,
Destroyer dark and White Soul of light!
Bared by life's ever beating brine,
The rocky bases that define
Of good and ill the place of meeting,
Be bugle-call to this heart of mine!