University of Virginia Library

IX
WITH HARP AND CROWN

Sons of the Morning and Eternity,
Children of Benediction and of Light,
Daughters of angels' kisses: I have wrought
A little book of melody and love—
A book against the resurrection-day—
Song mystic of humanity divine,
Achieved in one regenerated heart—
Our bright sidereal beacon, Israfel.
I swear, my brethren, by the Orphic faith,
And by the faithful prophecies inscribed
Deep in discerning souls, that starry hosts
Lead on that spirit, and his reign is nigh.
He stands erect among frankincense clouds,
A pillar of melody; his saffron hair
Is a cloud of harpstrings; as he moves in grace
And ministers, the ground beneath his feet
Quivers in music, like a sounding-board;
The parted air about him slowly streams
Into faint flute-notes. In God's Holy Place
He wears himself the aspect of a god:
Has eyes and sees celestial hierarchies,
With companies of martyrs and of saints;
Has lips which shape man's language to divine
And voice it past the common range of sound,
To traverse God's infinity as prayer;
Has ears wherein celestial harmonies
Find passage through wide galleries of soul,
Wherein they circulate and amplify,
As in white sea-shells tinged with coral pink
All ocean's vastness hollowly resounds;
Has hands to sanctify by service meet
Among the vessels and the mysteries;
Has feet ascending to the throne of God;
And—with a clamorous music in his throat—
Utters the watchwords of eternity.