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The cloud then showed his golden head, and his bright form emerged
Hovering and glittering on the air before the face of Thel.
"O virgin, know'st thou not our steeds drink of the golden springs
Where Luvah doth renew his horses? Look'st thou on my youth,
And fearest thou because I vanish and am seen no more?
Nothing remains. O maid, I tell thee, when I pass away
It is to tenfold life, to love, to peace, and raptures holy.
Unseen descending weigh my light wings upon balmy flowers,
And court the fair-eye'd dew to take me to her shining tent:
The weeping virgin trembling kneels before the risen sun,
Till we arise, link'd in a golden band, and never part,
But walk united, bearing food to all our tender flowers."
"Dost thou, O little cloud? I fear that I am not like thee;
For I walk through the vales of Har, and smell the sweetest flowers;
But I feed not the little flowers: I hear the warbling birds,
But I feed not the warbling birds, they fly and seek their food:
But Thel delights in these no more because I fade away.
And all shall say, without a use this shining woman liv'd.
Or did she only live to be at death the food of worms? "
The Cloud reclin'd upon his airy throne and answer'd thus:
"Then if thou art the food of worms, O virgin of the skies,
How great thy use, how great thy blessing. Every thing that lives,
Lives not alone nor for itself Fear not and I will call
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