The Bridge of Fire (collection)/The Bridge of Fire
XVIII
The Bridge of Fire
I
Past the bright door of Heaven whose golden bars
Exclude the interchange of Night and Day,
Crowned with soft light, attired with shining stars,
Dwell the great Gods in durable array.
In all that land no frost, no fever mars
Their timeless periods of pomp and play:
Some drive about the Rim in painted cars,
And others drink eternity away.
The trumpet of their pride
Proclaims them glorified
In chronicles of unremembered sway;
And lady Goddesses
Surround with sweet caress
Their ivied paramours. "O rest!" they say:
"Here at our gentle bosoms lie,
And watch the sun and moon and world and years roll by!"
II
Hear now the song of those bright shapes that shine
Huge as Leviathans, tasting the fare
Delicate-sweet, while scented dews divine
Thrill from the ground and clasp the rosy air.—
"Sing on, sing out, and reach a hand for wine!
For the drunken Earth spins softly afloat down there,
And the stars burn low, and the sky is sapphirine,
And the little winds of Space are in our hair!
The little winds of Space
Blow in the Love-god's face,
The only God that lacks not praise and prayer;
Who sole preserves his power
While dynasties devour
Temples and shrines and stones without repair.
Still he goes forth as strong as ten,
A red immortal riding in the hearts of men!"
III
The Gods whose names are sunrise and delight
For him who loves the leafy ways of song,—
The Gods of Hellas have escaped the night
To walk above the stars, a royal throng,—
Zeus and Poseidon and the Boy most bright,
The twain to whom the sceptred shades belong,
Majestical Princesses famed in fight,
And Aphrodite sweet to charm the strong:
And younger Gods than these
That peep among the trees,
And dance when Dionysus beats his gong:
And old disastrous Gods
That nod with snaky nods,—
Allecto swift to strike with dripping throng:
Itself the dull profound of Hell
Spits reeling Typhon forth that in the dark did dwell.
IV
Shadows there are that seem to look for home,
Each one a gloom upon the stellar plain,
Voiced like a great bell swinging in a dome,
Appealing mightily for realms to reign.
One said—"These are the shapeless Gods of Rome,
The tired-out Gods of labour, sweat and pain:
These watched the peasant turn his sullen loam,
These dragged him forth to fight and strive again,—
Saturnus white and old,
Who lost the age of gold,
Mars and Minerva standing on the slain,
Pomona from whose womb
The fruits in season come,
And she who gathers in the mellow grain,
And ghouls of the revengeful dead,
Larvae and Lemures that clamour to be fed."
V
Belus and Ra and that most jealous Lord
Who rolled the hosts of Pharaoh in the sea,
Giants and Trolls, in every hand a sword,
Gnomes and Dwarfs and the Spectral Company,
Gods that take vengeance, Gods that grant reward,
Gods that exact a murdered devotee,
Buddha the Wise, and Siva the Abhorred,
And Norns that tend Ygdrasil, fatal tree,
And Isis of the Moon
Who kept the stars in tune,
With her mad Phrygian sister, Cybele,
And Mithras swift to save
The faithful and the brave,
And Allah rumbling on to victory,—
Behold! and oldest of them all,
Square heads that leer and lust, and lizard shapes that crawl.
VI
The astral light grows dim upon the dales,
As he who loved the sinner and the child,
Before whose beauty still the tyrant quails
Comes by alone, a quiet man and mild.
The voice of all reproach is fixed and fails;
The heart is willing to be reconciled.
Was it his work, the groaning in the jails?
When bodies writhed and wept, could he have smiled?
Be strong, undaunted soul,
To break the aureole:
Release our chain, but leave him unreviled.
Though sweet the lily blows
The fire upon the rose
Alone shall guide thee on the bitter wild,
At last to find no Lotus land,
But one where Truth may touch thee dying with sweet hand.
VII
Between the pedestals of Night and Morning,
Between red Death and radiant Desire,
With clamour of delight and doubt and warning
The High Gods stand upon the Bridge of Fire.
O Soul, lay down thy pride, and cease adorning
Thy brows with laurel or with gold thy lyre!
The wheels of Time are turning, turning, turning;
The slow Stream waits for thee, the stagnant Mire.
The Dreamer and his Dream
Shall struggle in the Stream
Sunless and unredeemable for ever,
Since this the Gods command,
That he who leaves their land
Shall travel down to that relentless River.
"O Master of the World," I cry,
"Save me from fear of Death: I dare not die."