Beautiful Mother, I am not thy son. I know from echoes far behind the sky. I know; I know not why. Even from thy golden, wide oblivion: Thy careless leave to help thy harvesting, Thy leave to work a little, live, and sing; Thy leave to suffer--yea, to sing and die, Beautiful Mother! ... Ah, Whose child am I? _Love sang to me. And I went down the stair, And out into the darkness and the dew; And bowed myself unto the little grass, And the blind herbs, and the unshapen dust Of earth without a face. So let me be._ _For as I hear, the singing makes of me My own desire, and momently I grow. Yea, all the while with hands of melody, The singing makes me, out of what I was, Even as a potter shaping Eden clay._ _Ever Love sings, and saith in words that sing, 'Beloved, thus art thou; and even so Lovely art thou, Beloved!'--Even so, As the Sea weaves her path before the light, I hear, I hear, and I am glorified._ _Love sang to me, and I am glorified Because of some commandment in the stars. And I shall grow in favour and in shining, Till at the last I am all-beautiful; Beautiful, for the day Love sings no more._ THE FEASTER Oh, who will hush that cry outside the doors, While we are glad within? Go forth, go forth, all you my servitors; (And gather close, my kin.) Go out to her. Tell her we keep a feast,-- Lost Loveliness who will not sit her down Though we implore. It is her silence binds me unreleased, It is her silence that no flute can drown, It is her moonlit silence at the door, Wide as the whiteness, but a fire on high That frights my heart with an immortal Cry, Calling me evermore. Louder, you viols;--louder, O my harp; Let me not hear her voice; And drown her keener silence, silver-sharp, With waves of golden noise! For she is wise as Eden, even mute, To search my spirit through the deep and height Again, again. Outpierce her with your singing, dawnlike flute; And you, gloom over, viols of the night With colors lost in umber,--with sweet pain Of richest world's desire,--prevail, sing down All memory with pleading, so you drown Her merciless refrain! Oh, can you not with music, nor with din, Save me the stress and stir In my lone spirit, throned among my kin, From that same voice of her?-- The never ending query she hath had Only to wake my Soul, and only then Wake it to weep? With '_Why?_' and '_Art thou happy? Art thou glad? And hast thou fellowship with fellow-men?_' So, through my mirth and underneath my sleep; Her voice,--abysmal hunger unfulfilled;-- The calling, calling, never to be stilled,-- Calling of deep to deep.