Book III: Olympus — Apollo

And then stood forth
The last of the gods I saw, the first in rank
And dignity and beauty, the young god
Who grows not old, the Light of Heaven and Earth,
The Worker from afar, who sends the fire
Of inspiration to the bard and bathes
The world in hues of heaven--the golden link
Between High God and Man.
With a sweet voice
Whose every note was sweetest melody--
The melody has fled, the words remain--
Apollo sang:
"I know how fair the face
Of Purity; I know the treasure of Strength;
I know the charm of Love, the calmer grace
Of Wisdom and of Duteous well-spent lives:
And yet there is a loftier height than these.

There is a Height higher than mortal thought;
There is a Love warmer than mortal love;
There is a Life which taketh not its hues
From Earth or earthly things; and so grows pure
And higher than the petty cares of men,
And is a blessed life and glorified.

Oh, white young souls, strain upward, upward still,
Even to the heavenly source of Purity!
Brave hearts, bear on and suffer! Strike for right,
Strong arms, and hew down wrong! The world hath need
Of all of you--the sensual wrongful world!

Hath need of you, and of thee too, fair Love.
Oh, lovers, cling together! the old world
Is full of Hate. Sweeten it; draw in one
Two separate chords of Life; and from the bond
Of twin souls lost in Harmony create
A Fair God dwelling with you--Love, the Lord!

Waft yourselves, yearning souls, upon the stars;
Sow yourselves on the wandering winds of space;
Watch patient all your days, if your eyes take
Some dim, cold ray of Knowledge. The dull world
Hath need of you--the purblind, slothful world!

Live on, brave lives, chained to the narrow round
Of Duty; live, expend yourselves, and make
The orb of Being wheel onward steadfastly
Upon its path--the Lord of Life alone
Knows to what goal of Good; work on, live on:
And yet there is a higher work than yours.

To have looked upon the face of the Unknown
And Perfect Beauty. To have heard the voice
Of Godhead in the winds and in the seas.
To have known Him in the circling of the suns,
And in the changeful fates and lives of men.

To be fulfilled with Godhead as a cup
Filled with a precious essence, till the hand
On marble or on canvas falling, leaves
Celestial traces, or from reed or string
Draws out faint echoes of the voice Divine
That bring God nearer to a faithless world.

Or, higher still and fairer and more blest,
To be His seer, His prophet; to be the voice
Of the Ineffable Word; to be the glass
Of the Ineffable Light, and bring them down
To bless the earth, set in a shrine of Song.

For Knowledge is a barren tree and bare,
Bereft of God, and Duty but a word,
And Strength but Tyranny, and Love, Desire,
And Purity a folly; and the Soul,
Which brings down God to Man, the Light to the world;
He is the Maker, and is blest, is blest!"

He ended, and I felt my soul grow faint
With too much sweetness.
In a mist of grace
They faded, that bright company, and seemed
To melt into each other and shape themselves
Into new forms, and those fair goddesses
Blent in a perfect woman--all the calm
High motherhood of Here, the sweet smile
Of Cypris, fair Athene's earnest eyes,
And the young purity of Artemis,
Blent in a perfect woman; and in her arms,
Fused by some cosmic interlacing curves
Of Beauty into a new Innocence,
A child with eyes divine, a little child,
A little child--no more.
And those great gods
Of Power and Beauty left a heavenly form
Strong not to act, but suffer; fair and meek,
Not proud and eager; with soft eyes of grace,
Not bold with joyous youth; and for the fire
Of song, and for the happy careless life,
A sorrowful pilgrimage--changed, yet the same
Only Diviner far; and keeping still
The Life God-lighted and the sacrifice.

And when these faded wholly, at my side,
Tho' hidden before by those too-radiant forms,
I was aware once more of her, my guide
Psyche, who had not left me, floating near
On golden wings; and all the plains of heaven
Were left to us, me and my soul alone.