Page:The city of dreadful night - and other poems (IA cityofdreadfulni00thomrich).pdf/79

---

Passionless, senseless, thoughtless, let me dream
Some ever-slumbrous, never-varying theme,
Within the shadow of thy Timeless Land.

That when I thus have drunk my inmost fill
Of perfect peace, I may arise renewed;
In soul and body, intellect and will,
Equal to cope with Life whate'er its mood;
To sway its storm and energise its calm;
Through rhythmic years evolving like a psalm
Of infinite love and faith and sanctitude.

But if this cannot be, no less I cry,
Come, lead me with thy terrorless control
Down to our Mother's bosom, there to die
By abdication of my separate soul:
So shall this single, self-impelling piece
Of mechanism from lone labour cease,
Resolving into union with the Whole.

Our Mother feedeth thus our little life,
That we in turn may feed her with our death:
The great Sea sways, one interwoven strife,
Wherefrom the Sun exhales a subtle breath,