Page:The Poet in the Desert.djvu/53

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Mysterious mechanic ;

Gardener of the world,

Creator of the soul ;

Master of the universe,

Riding upon the stars as steeds ;

Irresistible as the whirling of the sun ;

Eternal as the pilgrimage of Day into Night ;

Moulder of manhood and maker of man.

Man is subject unto Love, not Love unto Man.

Shall this spotted lizard of the Desert

Chain the procession of the stars?

Man has dared to say

That Love shall not be free.

The winds not free?

The tides of ocean chained and mastered?

The mighty rivers tamed and turned to flow

Back to their inaudible beginnings?

The sun, the moon, the stars, to dance as puppets on a

string When Man grimaces in his little book of laws and wags

his finger? When was Love not free? Who stayed his coming or his

going? Who caught or bound him. Master of Life? Who commanded or delivered the Supreme Sovereign? Man may squint at the stars; dance before his own

shadow ; Cherish his ignorance and bow down before his puppets. But he cannot control Love, Creator of all, the Beginning

and the End.

POET: Shall Man, with his crooked fingers, Like a child upon the beach.

Build a sand-rampart to hold the furious surges of the sea?

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