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English Roses

by F. Harald Williams [i.e. F. W. O. Ward]

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333

WHAT IS LIFE?

O what is life? We cannot tell,
And none hath ever known
The secret of God's crucible,
By Nature made her own.
And earth is weak, and cannot speak
Whereof its seed was sown.
O what is life? I asked the blade
Of grass bepearled with dew,
What dim laboratory made
Its robe of emerald new.
But all it said, as half afraid,
Was that from Space it drew.
O what is life? I asked the star
Low in the evening sky,
Which watched me sweetly and not far
And sang a lullaby.
But what its strain, enwound with pain,
Abides a mystery.
O what is life? I asked my heart,
Which fluttered as I spoke;
What gave created things the start,
Whence man at length awoke.
And what I yearned so far, I learned
When it with rapture broke.