Page:The roamer and other poems (1920).djvu/115

Rh Unseen, unknown, unsensed, ineffable;

And all my being with bright passion shook.

Such moments, like the heavenly messenger,

Announce a birth divine; they cannot die;

And never after faded that pure ray.

It crept on human faces, forms of youth,

The smile of woman, hero, saint, and child,

And lit my youth from many a great design

Of mighty artists, where the risen soul,

Above the tomb as on a pedestal

Seated immortal, waited heaven's ascent;

Or crosses, on Judæan mounts relieved,

Led up the eye; or golden clouds enthroned

Virgin and martyr,—Italy enskied

Above her long-lined hills; but most it shone,

Where marble forms immovable of gods

Stayed the one moment of eternity

That ever is, and flashed through time and tide

The radiant presence of a greater world

Of timeless beauty, omnipresent thought,

The element of immortality,

Wherein the universe is lightly borne.

Then came a greater wonder. The ideal

Shone on me from the living forms of men

More than from paint, or clay, or gleaming stone,

Or the fair shapes that light the brooding mind.