Not as two errant spheres together grind
With monstrous ruin in the
vast of space,
Destruction born of that malign
embrace,
Their hapless peoples all to death consigned—
Not so when our intangible worlds of mind,
Even mine and yours, each
with its spirit race
Of beings shadowy in form
and face,
Shall drift together on some blessed wind.
No, in that marriage of gloom and light
All miracles of beauty shall
be wrought,
Attesting a diviner
faith than man’s;
For all my sad-eyed daughters of the night
Shall smile on your sweet
seraphim of thought,
Nor any jealous
god forbid the banns.
THE BIRTH OF VIRTUE.
When, long ago, the young world circling
flew
Through wider reaches of a richer blue,
New-eyed, the men and maids saw, manifest,
The thoughts untold in one another’s
breast:
Each wish displayed, and every passion
learned—
A look revealed them as a look discerned.
But sating Time with clouds o’ercast
their eyes;
Desire was hidden, and the lips framed
lies.
A goddess then, emerging from the dust,
Fair Virtue rose, the daughter of Distrust.
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