Madmoments: or First Verseattempts :: :: University of Virginia Library

What look'st thou at, Antinous? for sure
On Vacancy such Gaze was never bent:
To what far Regions calm and bright, and pure
From Life's vain Turmoil, is thy Spirit sent
Abroad on fancywing'd Discovery?
Gazing and gázing 'till the Void grows filled,
And from the Womb of Nothing there arise
A world of Beauty: 'till the sensual Eye,
In which the Soul its Essence has instilled,
Th' Invisible unconsciously descries!

2

Oh breathing Marble, on whose placid Brow,
With soft Locks blown as by the Summerair
And bended Head, the restless Years leave no
Remembered Trace, and from whose Lips so fair
Time cannot banish for a Moment's Space
The quiet Smile, there mantling like the Bloom
Upon the untouched Floweret of the Spring,
To us, still toiling in Life's troublous Race,
'Tis sweet to see thee, happy one, on whom
The passing Hour throws no dark Shade from its Wing!

3

Oh might those Lips but find a Voice to speak
What 'tis thine Eye looks on: methinks e'en now
A Whisper on mine inner Ear doth break,
But straight it fades in mistic Echos low
Thro' the unfathomable Soul, there lost
Amid those Depths which with Eternity
Communicate, tho' how we know not: strange!
Upon the mighty Ocean we are tost,
And still the Current sweeps unknowingly
Our Bark beyond e'en Fancy's widest Range

4

Where Shore and Polestar are no longer seen!
And thou, pure Marble! with thy Form so chaste,
Art likest some bright vision which has been
Revealed unto us in our sleep, embraced
But for a moment and then lost again
In its own Glory, like an Angelsform
That melts away into the Ether blue
From whence it broke upon us: but in vain
The Film falls from our Fyes, soon Cloud and Storm
Sweep the brief Glimpse of Ether from our View!

5

Gaze on, gaze on, thricehappy one, gaze on
That brighter world which to thy favored Eyes
Is opened up: that world which we alone
By Faith and calm Content can realize,
Whose Magiccircle, small as it may seem
To those who stand without, to him inside
Is rich and ample as—Eternity!
At Times as if I stepp'd into thy Dream
Visions of Bliss float up 'till then denied,
And Death seems but a Name and Time mere Jugglery!

6

Then do I consciously posses my whole,
My undivided self, and feel I live
In Oneness with the universal Soul
Of human Being: I no longer strive
To comprehend the mistic Nature by
Which thou, fair Marbleform, art haunted as
By some bright Spirit's Presence— I am one
With it, it is in me e'en as in thy
Still Life, felt when the Soul awaken'd has
Look'd thro' itself, those Depths so little known,

7

E'en to ourselves, to all save God's clear Eye
Whose calm Glance there at Times meets ours! and he
Who should possess his Soul, who consciously
Could grasp it in its Height and Depth would be
Like unto God! yea, he might look before
And after thro 'the Life of Things! but who
Can take the measure of his Soul? who feels
Not self too vast for self? for still the more
We search the more we grope and so must do,
'Tis in Eternity, on whose dark Brink Thought reels!

8

For tell me is not Soul Eternity?
Was it not once ere this frail Flesh was made
To shackle it, when this in Dust shall be
Will it not be with its first Form arrayed
Again as heretofore? who then, I say,
Shall compass that of which he neither knows
The End nor the Beginning? then tho' we
Should search and search until our Heads grow gray,
Sense doth impassable Barriers oppose,
And what Soul is we forefeel mistily!

For the Soul's secret is God's too, he is
Our Soul, and in its Boundlessness 't is his:
When most we lose ourselves in it, then most
'Tis his, in which all others must be lost!