Page:Anthology of Modern Slavonic Literature in Prose and Verse by Paul Selver.djvu/262

 

With the branded token of their destiny,
Buling over ardour and sorrow of myriads
And dispatching death to their fields as a gleaner
And to their quarries as a hewer of stone for their building
(As a multitude in amazement gazing to a single point
They leave the ages behind them;
And kingdoms, like ships, upon which mariners have leapt from the shore,
Sway beneath their poise even to capsizing)
Because of the mighty bliss of being mauled as a billow
By the surge of a majestical ocean of brethren
And of spurting up in the crest of foam like a sprig of white blossom
At the buffeting against cliffs of the promised land.

Because of hidden spring-tides of harmony
Set in the woven fabric of all things
Like butterfly-wings of the opalescent azure at evening,
Asparkle with the scaliness of stars,
Blissful is life!

Because of the approaching advent of the radiant mortal of mystery,
Who alone among myriad brethren that shall be and have been,
Conqueror over space,