Page:Poems, Emerson, 1847.djvu/180

168 As, when a shower of meteors

Cross the orbit of the earth,

And, lit by fringent air,

Blaze near and far,

Mortals deem the planets bright

Have slipped their sacred bars,

And the lone seaman all the night

Sails, astonished, amid stars.

Beauty of a richer vein,

Graces of a subtler strain,

Unto men these moonmen lend,

And our shrinking sky extend.

So is man's narrow path

By strength and terror skirted;

Also, (from the song the wrath

Of the Genii be averted!

The Muse the truth uncolored speaking,)

The Dæmons are self-seeking:

Their fierce and limitary will

Draws men to their likeness still.