II
Beauty!—O, well for the hearts that bow down and adore her:
Heart of mine, hold thou in all the world nothing before her.
All the fair universe now to her feet that is clinging
Out of the womb of her leapt with the dawn, and the singing
Of stars. O thou Beautiful!—thee do I worship and praise
In the dark where thy lamps are; again in thy glory of days,
Whose end and beginning thou blessest with piercing delight
Of splendors outspread on the edge of the robe of the night.
Ah, that sweetness is sent not to him whose dull spirit would rest
In the bliss of it; no, not the goal, but the passion and quest;
Not the vale, but the desert. O, never soft airs shall awake
Thy Soul to the soul of all Beauty, all heaven, and all wonder;
The summons that comes to thee, mortal, thy spirit to shake,
Shall be the loud clarion's call and the voices of thunder.
