Page:Poems by Frances Fuller Victor.djvu/98

 Faint and far, faint and far,

Surging up soft between sun and star,

Strains of revelry smote his ear,

Musical murmurs from lyre and lute,

Rising in choruses grand and clear,

Sinking in cadences almost mute,

Vexing the ear of him who sate

Wearied beside the Shining Gate.

Sad and low,

Flowed in an undertone of woe.

Wailing among the moons it came,

Sobbing in echoes against the stars,

Smothered behind some comet's flame,

Lost in the wind of the warlike Mars,

Mingling, ever and anon,

With the music's swell a sigh or moan.

"As in a glass

Let the earth once before me pass,"

The Old Year said; and space untold

Vanished 'till nothing came between,

Folded away, crystal and gold,

Nor azure air did intervene—

"As in a glass" he saw the earth

Decking a bier, and waiting a birth.

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