Page:The poems of George Eliot (Crowell, 1884).djvu/331

 From in and outer, as a little child

Sits on a bank and sees blue heavens mild

Down in the water, and forgets its limbs,

And knoweth naught save the blue heaven that swims.

"Jubal," the face said, "I am thy loved Past,

The soul that makes thee one from first to last.

I am the angel of thy life and death,

Thy outbreathed being drawing its last breath.

Am I not thine alone, a dear dead bride

Who blest thy lot above all men's beside?

Thy bride whom thou wouldst never change, nor take

Any bride living, for that dead one's sake?

Was I not all thy yearning and delight,

Thy chosen search, thy senses' beauteous Right,

Which still had been the hunger of thy frame

In central heaven, hadst thou been still the same?

Wouldst thou have asked aught else from any god—

Whether with gleaming feet on earth he trod

Or thundered through the skies—aught else for share

Of mortal good, than in thy soul to bear

The growth of song, and feel the sweet unrest

Of the world's spring-tide in thy conscious breast?

No, thou hadst grasped thy lot with all its pain,

Nor loosed it any painless lot to gain

Where music's voice was silent; for thy fate

Was human music's self incorporate:

Thy senses' keenness and thy passionate strife

Were flesh of her flesh and her womb of life.

And greatly hast thou lived, for not alone

With hidden raptures were her secrets shown,

Buried within thee, as the purple light

Of gems may sleep in solitary night;

But thy expanding joy was still to give,

And with the generous air in song to live,