| O POWER to whom this earthly clime | |
| Is but an atom in the whole, | |
| O Poet-heart of Space and Time, | |
| O Maker and immortal Soul, | |
| Within whose glowing rings are bound, | 5 |
| Out of whose sleepless heart had birth | |
| The cloudy blue, the starry round, | |
| And this small miracle of earth: | |
| |
| Who liv’st in every living thing, | |
| And all things are thy script and chart, | 10 |
| Who rid’st upon the eagle’s wing, | |
| And yearnest in the human heart; | |
| O Riddle with a single clue, | |
| Love, deathless, protean, secure, | |
| The ever old, the ever new, | 15 |
| O Energy, serene and pure. | |
| |
| Thou, who art also part of me, | |
| Whose glory I have sometime seen, | |
| O Vision of the Ought-to-be, | |
| O Memory of the Might-have-been, | 20 |
| I have had glimpses of thy way, | |
| And moved with winds and walked with stars, | |
| But, weary, I have fallen astray, | |
| And, wounded, who shall count my scars? | |
| |
| O Master, all my strength is gone; | 25 |
| Unto the very earth I bow; | |
| I have no light to lead me on; | |
| With aching heart and burning brow, | |
| I lie as one that travaileth | |
| In sorrow more than he can bear; | 30 |
| I sit in darkness as of death, | |
| And scatter dust upon my hair. | |
| |
| The God within my soul hath slept, | |
| And I have shamed the nobler rule; | |
| O Master, I have whined and crept; | 35 |
| O Spirit, I have played the fool. | |
| Like him of old upon whose head | |
| His follies hung in dark arrears, | |
| I groan and travail in my bed, | |
| And water it with bitter tears. | 40 |
| |
| I stand upon thy mountain-heads, | |
| And gaze until mine eyes are dim; | |
| The golden morning glows and spreads; | |
| The hoary vapours break and swim. | |
| I see thy blossoming fields, divine, | 45 |
| Thy shining clouds, thy blessèd trees— | |
| And then that broken soul of mine— | |
| How much less beautiful than these! | |
| |
| O Spirit, passionless, but kind, | |
| Is there in all the world, I cry, | 50 |
| Another one so base and blind, | |
| Another one so weak as I? | |
| O Power, unchangeable, but just, | |
| Impute this one good thing to me, | |
| I sink my spirit to the dust | 55 |
| In utter dumb humility. | |
