Oh, yet we trust that somehow good
Will be the final end of ill,
To pangs of nature, sins of will,
Defects of doubt, and taints of blood;
That nothing walks with aimless feet;
That not one life shall be destroy'd,
Or cast as rubbish to the void,
When God hath made the pile complete;
That not a worm is cloven in vain;
That not a moth with vain desire
I shrivell'd in a fruitless fire,
Or but subserves another's gain.
Behold, we know not anything;
I can but trust that good shall fall
At last--far off--at last, to all,
And every winter change to spring.
So runs my dream: but what am I?
An infant crying in the night:
An infant crying for the light:
And with no language but a cry.
The wish, that of the living whole
Are God and Nature then at strife,
That I, considering everywhere
I falter where I firmly trod,
I stretch lame hands of faith, and grope,
"So careful of the type?" but no.
"Thou makest thine appeal to me:
Man, her last work, who seem'd so fair,
Who trusted God was love indeed
Who loved, who suffer'd countless ills,
No more? A monster then, a dream,
O life as futile, then, as frail!
No life may fail beyond the grave,
Derives it not from what we have
The likest God within the soul?
That Nature lends such evil dreams?
So careful of the type she seems,
So careless of the single life;
Her secret meaning in her deeds,
And finding that of fifty seeds
She often brings but one to bear,
And falling with my weight of cares
Upon the great world's altar-stairs
That slope thro' darkness up to God,
And gather dust and chaff, and call
To what I feel is Lord of all,
And faintly trust the larger hope.
From scarped cliff and quarried stone
She cries, "A thousand types are gone:
I care for nothing, all shall go.
I bring to life, I bring to death:
The spirit does but mean the breath:
I know no more." And he, shall he,
Such splendid purpose in his eyes,
Who roll'd the psalm to wintry skies,
Who built him fanes of fruitless prayer,
And love Creation's final law--
Tho' Nature, red in tooth and claw
With ravine, shriek'd against his creed--
Who battled for the True, the Just,
Be blown about the desert dust,
Or seal'd within the iron hills?
A discord. Dragons of the prime,
That tare each other in their slime,
Were mellow music match'd with him.
O for thy voice to soothe and bless!
What hope of answer, or redress?
Behind the veil, behind the veil.