For is it come to this, at last?
And thou forever must remain
A godlike statue, formed and cast
In marble attitude of pain,—
Proud lips that in their scorn are mute,
And haunting eyes of anguished love,
One hand that grasps a silent lute,
And one convulsèd hand above
That will not strike? Ah, scorn and shame!
Shame for the apostate unforgiven,
Beholding an unconquered fame
In undiscovered fields of heaven!
For Beauty not by one alone
In her completeness is revealed:
The smiles and tears her face hath shown
To thee from others are concealed.
Men see not in the midnight sky
All miracles she worketh there:
It is the blindness of the eye
That paints its darkness on the air.
Two friends who wander by the shore
Look not upon the selfsame seas,
Hearing two voices in the roar,
Because of different memories.
For him whose love the sea hath drowned,
It moans the music of his wrong;
For him whose life with love is crowned,
It breaks upon the beach in song.
So dreaming not another's dream,
But still interpreting thine own,
By woodland wild and quiet stream
Thou wanderest in the world alone.
Then what thou slayest none can save:
Silent and dark oblivion rolls
Over the glory in the grave
Of fierce and suicidal souls.
From that dark wave no pleading ghost
With pointing hand shall ever rise,
To say,—The world hath treasure lost,
And here the buried treasure lies!