 | English Roses |  |
HOW TO LIVE.
I sat at a Sage's feet,
As I questioned him how to live,
Where the misty currents meet
And all faiths are fugitive.
But he puckered his awful brow,
While a glance from the caverned eyes
Made me listen and lower bow
To the flash out of thunder skies.
“There is only one way,” he said;
“Do not sport on the ocean brink,
But launch on it unafraid
With your reason's helm—and Think.”
As I questioned him how to live,
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And all faiths are fugitive.
But he puckered his awful brow,
While a glance from the caverned eyes
Made me listen and lower bow
To the flash out of thunder skies.
“There is only one way,” he said;
“Do not sport on the ocean brink,
But launch on it unafraid
With your reason's helm—and Think.”
I lay at a woman's feet,
Still seeking the unfound Truth,
As she swayed in her beauty sweet
And the warm voluptuous youth.
So I asked the secret still,
How my task could be really wrought
Of the dubious good and ill
And the actions that led to nought.
But she pouted her scarlet lips,
And upraised a perfumed glove
With her scornful finger tips—
“O the answer is simple—Love.”
Still seeking the unfound Truth,
As she swayed in her beauty sweet
And the warm voluptuous youth.
So I asked the secret still,
How my task could be really wrought
Of the dubious good and ill
And the actions that led to nought.
But she pouted her scarlet lips,
And upraised a perfumed glove
With her scornful finger tips—
“O the answer is simple—Love.”
Then I stood in the labouring throng
As I darkened yet more the gloom,
In the unequal fight with wrong
To the same pre-destined doom.
And I begged for a clear reply
From the to lers who came and went,
In their useless agony
And the ruts incontinent.
But they hardly checked their haste,
While they harvested barren spoil
For their children's idle waste,
And the dull response was—“Toil.”
As I darkened yet more the gloom,
In the unequal fight with wrong
To the same pre-destined doom.
And I begged for a clear reply
From the to lers who came and went,
In their useless agony
And the ruts incontinent.
But they hardly checked their haste,
While they harvested barren spoil
For their children's idle waste,
And the dull response was—“Toil.”
So I knelt at the shadowed shrine
In the columned courts of prayer,
Where the stillness stung like wine
And peace was the hidden stayer.
Could it solve the enigma old
In teaching me how to live,
With no wisdom gained by gold
But its pure prerogative?
And the incense floated up
Over dust where the groundlings lie,
From the swinging censer cup,
And the Silence echoed—“Die.”
In the columned courts of prayer,
Where the stillness stung like wine
And peace was the hidden stayer.
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In teaching me how to live,
With no wisdom gained by gold
But its pure prerogative?
And the incense floated up
Over dust where the groundlings lie,
From the swinging censer cup,
And the Silence echoed—“Die.”
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