No voice. No light, no sound. It was the fancy that At midnight makes rebound Of thoughts we labour at At mid-day. Let us sleep. The night is very black, The heat a madness—sleep Before the day comes back. Who cries!—The voice again! It is the storm that breaks! The tempest and the rain! The quivering crash that shakes! The thunder and the flash, The brand that rips and roars, The winds of God that dash And split a thousand doors! The chariots of God That gallop on the plain And shake the solid sod! Awake!—The rain, the rain! Thunder and burst, O Sky; Thunder and boil, O Deep; Let the thick thunder cry; Let the live lightning leap! Smite white light like the sword Of Heav’n from heav’n’s height; Consume the thing abhor’d And quell the dreadful night! Smite white light like the brand Of God from heav’n to earth; And purge the desolate land Of this destroying dearth! IV O Wilderness of Death, O Desert rent and riv’n, Where art thou?—for the breath Of heav’n hath made thee Heav’n. I know not now these ways; The rocky rifts are gone, Deep-verdured like the braes Of blest Avilion. Here where there were no flowers The heav’nly waters flow, And thro’ a thousand bowers Innum’rable blossoms blow. * * * * * * * * REPLY I This day relenting God Hath placed within my hand A wondrous thing; and God Be praised. At His command, Seeking His secret deeds With tears and toiling breath, I find thy cunning seeds, O million-murdering Death. I know this little thing A myriad men will save. O Death, where is thy sting? Thy victory, O Grave? August 21, 1897. II Before Thy feet I fall, Lord, who made high my fate; For in the mighty small Thou showedst the mighty great. Henceforth I will resound But praises unto Thee; Tho’ I was beat and bound, Thou gavest me victory. Tho’ in these depths of night Deep-dungeon’d I was hurl’d, Thou sentest me a light Wherewith to mend the world. O Exile, while thine eyes Were weary with the night Thou weepedst; now arise And bless the Lord of Light. Hereafter let thy lyre Be bondsman to His name; His thunder and His fire Will fill thy lips with flame. He is the Lord of Light; He is the Thing That Is; He sends the seeing sight; And the right mind is His. III The cagèd bird awake All night laments his doom, And hears the dim dawn break About the darken’d room;