Page:Poems, Household Edition, Emerson, 1904.djvu/257

Rh On spawning slime my song prevails,

Wolves shed their fangs, and dragons scales;

Flushed in the sky the sweet May-morn,

Earth smiled with flowers, and man was born.

Then Asia yeaned her shepherd race,

And Nile substructs her granite base,—

Tented Tartary, columned Nile,—

And, under vines, on rocky isle,

Or on wind-blown sea-marge bleak,

Forward stepped the perfect Greek:

That wit and joy might find a tongue,

And earth grow civil, sung.

Flown to Italy from Greece,

I brooded long and held my peace,

For I am wont to sing uncalled,

And in days of evil plight

Unlock doors of new delight;

And sometimes mankind I appalled

With a bitter horoscope,

With spasms of terror for balm of hope.

Then by better thought I lead

Bards to speak what nations need;

So I folded me in fears,

And searched the triple spheres,

Moulding Nature at his will,

So shaped, so colored, swift or still,

And, sculptor-like, his large design

Etched on Alp and Apennine.