But you, should that be so, May very well, I know, May well To me in hell With recognising eyes Look from your Paradise-- "God bless Thy hopelessness!" Call, holy soul, O call The hosts angelical, And say,-- "See, far away "Lies one I saw on earth; One stricken from his birth With curse Of destinate verse. "What place doth He ye serve For such sad spirit reserve,-- Given, In dark lieu of Heaven, "The impitiable Dæmon, Beauty, to adore and dream on, To be Perpetually "Hers, but she never his? He reapeth miseries; Foreknows His wages woes; "He lives detachèd days; He serveth not for praise; For gold He is not sold; "Deaf is he to world's tongue; He scorneth for his song The loud Shouts of the crowd; "He asketh not world's eyes; Not to world's ears he cries; Saith,--'These Shut, if you please'; "He measureth world's pleasure, World's ease, as Saints might measure; For hire Just love entire "He asks, not grudging pain; And knows his asking vain, And cries-- 'Love! Love!' and dies, "In guerdon of long duty, Unowned by Love or Beauty; And goes-- Tell, tell, who knows! "Aliens from Heaven's worth, Fine beasts who nose i' the earth, Do there Reward prepare. "But are _his_ great desires Food but for nether fires? Ah me, A mystery! "Can it be his alone, To find, when all is known, That what He solely sought "Is lost, and thereto lost All that its seeking cost? That he Must finally, "Through sacrificial tears, And anchoretic years, Tryst With the sensualist?" So ask; and if they tell The secret terrible, Good friend, I pray thee send Some high gold embassage To teach my unripe age. Tell! Lest my feet walk hell. A DEAD ASTRONOMER (STEPHEN PERRY, S.J.) Starry amorist, starward gone, Thou art--what thou didst gaze upon! Passed through thy golden garden's bars, Thou seest the Gardener of the Stars. She, about whose moonèd brows Seven stars make seven glows, Seven lights for seven woes; She, like thine own Galaxy, All lustres in one purity:-- What said'st thou, Astronomer, When thou did'st discover _her_? When thy hand its tube let fall, Thou found'st the fairest star of all! A CORYMBUS FOR AUTUMN Hearken my chant,--'tis As a Bacchante's, A grape-spurt, a vine-splash, a tossed tress, flown vaunt 'tis!