Page:The poems of Richard Watson Gilder, Gilder, 1908.djvu/456

428 Hath flung eternal questionings in vain—

Yet hath he read a little in thy pages;

And him we miss, learned well from thee to mold,—

As by the hand of Fate, in time's dark womb,—

That mystic form, a thousand centuries old;

That mournless mourner near a tragic tomb.

XIII

Ye stars eternal! in your motions wide

I feel the march of time; audibly pours

To faithful ears the immemorial tide

Of starry seas that beat on infinite shores;

And, in that music magical, cold death,—

And grief its shadow,—melt and are undone;

And that which brings the miracle of breath,

And that which takes,—ay, that which takes,—are one.

XIV

O star of war! beyond thy troublous beams

His freed soul wings to a great calm at last;

The deep night, with its tremulous, starry streams

Of light celestial, pours repose so vast

Naught can escape that flood; and now the faces,

Angelical, he molded with pure art,

In majesty look forth from heavenly spaces.

Enter thy peace, O high, tempestuous heart!