My heart cried out in wonder: Can it be, The form, from which this thrilling passion flows On tides of beauty and eternal tone Audibly now before the very sense Of thronging thousands, somewhere in the clay Of Russia lies, with folded hands--relapsed Into the Formless? And my mind replied: The longing that so labors for release Not wholly in that transient form was trapped Wherein we perish miserably here-- But has escaped into the form supreme, A deathless body; and now walks abroad Among the generations of mankind, Trailing the robes of the immortal woe. And still that music poured. O sacred heart And secret, well-head of those streams of song-- Are you content! How is it with you now, O breast whose sorrows overflowed the world! MIRROR On the wide sea of sleep I launch my gliding boat: Over the rhythmic Deep On flowing tides I float. The curving shore around Fades in the pale starlight-- A slumbering, sleepy sound Goes drifting through the night. It is the music of dreams Along the horizon blown, It stirs the glimmering streams Where the pale stars lie strown. The stars shine in the Deep, Reflected from afar; My eyes tremble with sleep, Reflecting sea and star. My eyes look up at me Out of the mirrored eyes, And in their depths I see Mirrored the stars and skies. Around--around--around My boat whirls with the stream; I feel a dizzy sound Around me, like a dream. Where may I moor my bark? How may I lift my head? What is that silence? Hark-- The sound of dreams is fled! The breath of slumber lies, Like perfume, on the Deep: Night with a thousand eyes Stares at herself in sleep. PLAINT Brief is Man’s travail here, and transitory His wrath that soon is spent-- Brief his lament, Lifted in vain against the harsh decrees Of the high Destinies That move not for the murmur of his woe: Even as snow On sunny meadows, as a lover’s story Told in an April twilight long ago, Brief is he even as these-- His little hour of tumult or of glory-- And to what end devised we may not guess, Considering, as we go Toward the same shadows, bearing the same spark, His vanity and utter nothingness. Yet in the mighty Dark Dear is the spirit; grievously we know Earth has one burden more, one soul the less. ANDANTE The evening steals like an ocean around your playing, Whose perfect tones move on the sombre Deep With a grave gesture, and sigh into a sleep, George, where your hands, along the piano straying, An intricate rhythm keep. And all the room is starry with your dreaming, And limitless and vague. O the white square Of the window-pane shimmers behind you there, Framing the street, where the first lights are gleaming, Transfigured now and fair!