hough he damn.
Perhaps to cringe and cower and bring a shrine
a forced and faithless faith
Is far more futile than to fling your laughter in
the face of Death.
For writhe or whirl in dervish rout, they are not
flattered there on high,
Or sham belief to hide a doubt--no gods are mine
that love a lie!
Nor gods that beg belief on earth with portents
that some seer foretells--
Is life itself not wonder-worth that we must cry
for miracles?
Is it not strange enough we breathe? Does every-
thing not God reveal?
Or must we ever weave and wreathe some creed
that shall his face conceal?
Some creed of which its prophets cry it holds
the secret's all-in-all:
Some creed which ever bye and bye doth crumble,
totter, to its fall!
Say any dream of all the dreams that drift and
darkle, glint and glow,
Holds most of truth within its gleams; but say
--at last--you do not know.
Oh, say the soul, from star to star, with victory
wing'd, leap on through space
And scale the bastioned nights that bar the secret's
inner dwelling-place;
Or say it ever roam dim glades where pallid
wraiths of long-dead moons
Flit like blown feathers through the shades, borne
on the breath of sobbing tunes:
Say any tide of any time, of all the tides that ebb
and flow,
Shall buoy us on toward any clime; but say--at
last--you do not know!
LYRICS
"KING PANDION, HE IS DEAD"
"King Pandion, he is dead;
All thy friends are lapp'd in lead."
--SHAKESPEARE.
DREAMERS, drinkers, rebel youth,
Where's the folly free and fine
You and I mistook for truth?
Wits and wastrels, friends of wine,
Wags and poets, friends of mine,
Gleams and glamors all are fled,
Fires and frenzies half divine!
King Pandion, he is dead!
Time's unmannerly, uncouth!
Here's the crow's-foot for a sign!
And, upon our brows, forsooth,
Wits and wastrels, friends of wine,
Time hath set his mark malign;
Frost has touched us, heart and head,
Cooled the blood and dulled the eyne:
King Pandion, he is dead!
Time's a tyrant without ruth:--
Fancies used to bloom and twine
Round a common tavern booth,
Wits and wastrels, friends of wine,
In that youth of mine and thine!
'Tis for youth the feast is spread;
When we dine now--we but dine!--
King Pand
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