IV

OPPORTUNITY

Behold a hag whom Life denies a kiss
As he rides questward in knighterrant-wise;
Only when he hath passed her is it his
To know, too late, the Fairy in disguise.

V

DREAMS

They mock the present and they haunt the past,
And in the future there is naught agleam
With hope, the soul desires, that at last
The heart pursuing does not find a dream.

VI

THE STARS

These—­the bright symbols of man’s hope and fame,
In which he reads his blessing or his curse—­
Are syllables with which God speaks His name
In the vast utterance of the universe.

VII

BEAUTY

High as a star, yet lowly as a flower,
Unknown she takes her unassuming place
At Earth’s proud masquerade—­the appointed hour
Strikes, and, behold, the marvel of her face.

Processional

Universes are the pages
Of that book whose words are ages;
Of that book which destiny
Opens in eternity.

There each syllable expresses
Silence; there each thought a guess is;
In whose rhetoric’s cosmic runes
Roll the worlds and swarming moons.

There the systems, we call solar,
Equatorial and polar,
Write their lines of rushing light
On the awful leaves of night.

There the comets, vast and streaming,
Punctuate the heavens’ gleaming
Scroll; and suns, gigantic, shine,
Periods to each starry line.

There, initials huge, the Lion
Looms and measureless Orion;
And, as ’neath a chapter done,
Burns the Great-Bear’s colophon.

Constellated, hieroglyphic,
Numbering each page terrific,
Fiery on the nebular black,
Flames the hurling zodiac.

In that book, o’er which Chaldean
Wisdom pored and many an eon
Of philosophy long dead,
This is all that man has read:—­

He has read how good and evil,—­
In creation’s wild upheaval,—­
Warred; while God wrought terrible
At foundations red of Hell.

He has read of man and woman;
Laws and gods, both beast and human;
Thrones of hate and creeds of lust,
Vanished now and turned to dust.

Arts and manners that have crumbled;
Cities buried; empires tumbled: 
Time but breathed on them its breath;
Earth is builded of their death.

These but lived their little hour,
Filled with pride and pomp and power;
What availed them all at last? 
We shall pass as they have past.

Still the human heart will dream on
Love, part angel and part demon;
Yet, I question, what secures
Our belief that aught endures?

In that book, o’er which Chaldean
Wisdom pored and many an eon
Of philosophy long dead,
This is all that man has read.