The Last Poems of Richard Watson Dixon ... Selected and Edited by Robert Bridges: With a Preface by M. E. Coleridge |
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TO THE EARTH PLANET |
 | The Last Poems of Richard Watson Dixon |  |
28
TO THE EARTH PLANET
Thou fliest far, thou fliest far
Companion of each circling star,
But yet thou dost but fill thy year:
Thy orbit mayst thou not forsake,
The path in space which thou must make,
Till death shall touch thy charmèd sphere.
Companion of each circling star,
But yet thou dost but fill thy year:
Thy orbit mayst thou not forsake,
The path in space which thou must make,
Till death shall touch thy charmèd sphere.
Half turning to the weary blaze
Which measures out thy countless days,
Half bathing in the depths of night,
Thou urgest thy unfaltering speed,
As if thou wouldst of force be freed:
But still thou art the slave of light.
Which measures out thy countless days,
Half bathing in the depths of night,
Thou urgest thy unfaltering speed,
As if thou wouldst of force be freed:
But still thou art the slave of light.
Or moved or fixed in vacancy
Thy pitying sisters gaze on thee,
Where'er be sped thy wondrous race:
Nigher to thee they may not come;
Their eyes weep light, their lips are dumb;
Time is their lord, their prison space.
Thy pitying sisters gaze on thee,
Where'er be sped thy wondrous race:
Nigher to thee they may not come;
Their eyes weep light, their lips are dumb;
Time is their lord, their prison space.
Thy lord is Time; to imitate
Eternity, yet bring thy date:
Space holds thee; but seems infinite.
But what of them? Thy mystery,
Or shared or not by them with thee,
Lies in thy breast—thy parasite.
Eternity, yet bring thy date:
Space holds thee; but seems infinite.
But what of them? Thy mystery,
Or shared or not by them with thee,
Lies in thy breast—thy parasite.
29
Art thou alone the planet, Earth,
That gives to being that new birth
Of which the womb is care and pain?
Lives man alone in that thick space
Which through thin space doth hugely race,
A clot that swims the immeasured main?
That gives to being that new birth
Of which the womb is care and pain?
Lives man alone in that thick space
Which through thin space doth hugely race,
A clot that swims the immeasured main?
Who answers? Not the instruments,
To pierce all space which he invents,
And to untwist each ray that beats
From the fire-fountain of these things,
And those remoter sparks, whose wings
Win flame from nature's other seats.
To pierce all space which he invents,
And to untwist each ray that beats
From the fire-fountain of these things,
And those remoter sparks, whose wings
Win flame from nature's other seats.
| The Last Poems of Richard Watson Dixon | |