Page:Poems and Baudelaire Flowers.djvu/36

32 May furious fool or sneerer Retard our steps when nearer And clearer, ever clearer,
 * We view the Coming Time?

The heavens overarching
 * With the echo shall be ringing
 * Of those who travel singing

To the goal of all their searching: The solid earth thereunder Shall thrill with joy and wonder Beneath the steady thunder
 * Of many nations marching.

Immeasurably vast
 * We see the multitude
 * Who stand where none have stood

And tread the plains at last (Error and Darkness riven), Of that terrestrial heaven For which the race has striven
 * Through all the ages past;

The land foreseen of old,
 * Where naught is reaped unsown
 * And human blood and bone

Are neither bought nor sold; An earth where kings’ oppressions And prayers and intercessions To priest-contrived obsessions
 * Shall be a strange tale told.