Poems (Hardy)/The rainbow
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For works with similar titles, see The rainbow.
THE RAINBOW
AS to the perfect round, ere it be gone,
My thought will flash that wondrous arc,
By sun and rain inevitably drawn
Upon the opposing distant dark
Of cloudy sky or thinnest lawn
Of hovering mist, I hark
To some clear voice that, like the dawn,
Arises, making morning in the mind.
My thought will flash that wondrous arc,
By sun and rain inevitably drawn
Upon the opposing distant dark
Of cloudy sky or thinnest lawn
Of hovering mist, I hark
To some clear voice that, like the dawn,
Arises, making morning in the mind.
It bids me find
The center of events that seem
Irrelevant as a dream,
The accidents of time and space;
It bids me never trace
The pattern of myself upon a life
To measure what may be its worth,
Nor think that, since I see no strife,
But only blue-sky living, joy and mirth,
I know the curve that sweeps away
Into the unfathomed soul's interior day;
The center of events that seem
Irrelevant as a dream,
The accidents of time and space;
It bids me never trace
The pattern of myself upon a life
To measure what may be its worth,
Nor think that, since I see no strife,
But only blue-sky living, joy and mirth,
I know the curve that sweeps away
Into the unfathomed soul's interior day;
It bids me frame, with lofty fear,
More purpose into day and year,
Since that I live at all may flame
Into a sunrise for a soul,
Or flare into a sunset of eternal dole.
More purpose into day and year,
Since that I live at all may flame
Into a sunrise for a soul,
Or flare into a sunset of eternal dole.
It bids me draw
An arc of splendor without flaw,
Of faith and hope and love, these three,
About this point, this life; an arc to be
Full-rounded in eternity.
An arc of splendor without flaw,
Of faith and hope and love, these three,
About this point, this life; an arc to be
Full-rounded in eternity.