When all were dreaming
But Pastheen Power,
A light came streaming
Beneath her bower:
A heavy foot
At her door delayed,
A heavy hand
On the latch was laid.

“Now who dare venture,
At this dark hour,
Unbid to enter
My maiden bower?”
“Dear Pastheen, open
The door to me,
And your true lover
You'll surely see.”

“My own true lover,
So tall and brave,
Lives exiled over
The angry wave.”
“Your true love's body
Lies on the bier,
His faithful spirit
Is with you here.”

“His look was cheerful,

I had a chair at every hearth,
When no one turned to see,
With 'Look at that old fellow there,
And who may he be?'
And therefore do I wander now,
And the fret lies on me.

The road-side trees keep murmuring.
Ah, wherefore murmur ye,
As in the old days long gone by,
Green oak and poplar tree?
The well-known faces are all gone:
And the fret lies on me.

Inscribe in austere characters this screed.
‘As in a golden urn here lies the dust
Of a poor boy whose dreams were so august
He might have changed the earth’ … all you, take heed!
You fond and foolish traffickers in greed
And spend not rashly what you hold in trust.
For you are unwise stewards and unjust,
That bartering childhood achieve wealth indeed.
In this bright coin shining like the sun
His passion glows and his brief visions burn.
But what the great deeds are he might have done
Are secrets that we shall not ever learn.

What dreams burn here, never to be revealed?
What visions of what archangelic things!
As many lives in this rich gold lie sealed
As in great tombs lie buried ancient kings.
Pick! Pick! Last night I heard the solemn spade
With clocklike sound and unremitting toil
Dig its slow sense of time into the soil.
The box was lowered. The pious parson prayed.
Blow, Gabriel, on thy trumpet! With that sound
Sing up men's bodies to a glorious morn.
Men's souls sleep here. Where is that godlike horn
Shall call them up out of this glittering ground?

How strange it is that these bright coins should be
Stamped with the Bird of Freedom! They should bear
Dark fierce inscriptions—outcries of despair;
But not the Bird of holiest Liberty.
Upon these national emblems let us see
Some solemn accusation that shall declare,
‘Ye serve the rich, the poor ye do not spare,
The Unpaid Toiler has not been set free.’
Carve on these coins the truth. So let us save
A conscience whited by too many lies.
Upon these discs of gold let us engrave
Men's dark biographies … make other dies …

There was a man that lived before the Flood—
He said, ‘Am I my brother's keeper?’ Then
He fled from out God's presence and from men
And the deep earth cried with his brother's blood.
Take heed of him, ye that have bought and sold
And deal in living flesh—lest not in vain
A bitter cry calls down the curse of Cain.
Take heed of him, ye tillers in bright gold.
I say that from these coins go up such cries
Their protestations shall assail the skies.
Where will you hide, you fugitives from God?
… You that are flushed with guilt

Here let Great Fortunes scroll their pedigrees,
Strange armorings of purple and of gold—
The Lion Rampant … see, I have been bold!—
The Running Fox … I am more swift than these!
How warm with history Great Fortunes are,
How blazonéd with rich heraldic signs,
With emblems of strong cities, ships and mines,
The oil, the corn, and all the pomp of war.
Some bear a crown and some a bloody sword,
Cruelly bright with the cold flash of steel.
Some in their gorgeous quarterings reveal
The penny in the fish-catch of the Lord.

Some old Astrologer might calculate
The movements of the orbs in such a cell—
Ascribing to each star its proper spell
And brooding on its laws, prognosticate.
The great metallic bodies of the night
With magnetisms such as sway and bind
Control great empires and coerce the mind,
Conduct their arbitrations on a height.
Their council chamber is the sky and there
The stars build up their strong immortal towers.
Bearers of unintelligible light
The planets sweep their treasuries through the air.
So through the world magnificently bright

In such a silence once Hans Glauber bent
All night above his crucible and scales
And with strange formulas dispelled the veils
That are the cloak around the element.
He summoned to his aid an airy power
Compounding essences with measures fine.
With cipher and with cabalistic sign
He crossed the passing of the midnight hour.
At his revolving fire in such a cell
He sought the vapor softer than a petal.
‘Azar and Azoth,’ cried he, ‘hold the spell,
The subtle spirit that lies not in the metal.’
So do great Fortunes curiously hold

In such a cell with compass and with scale
Some quaint geographer might subtly trap
The oceans and the earth into a map,
Painting the sea and sky with colors pale,
Embellished well with many a quaint design,
The elephant, the bullock and the ape,
The apple, the corn, the winepress and the grape,
The battle axe, the frigate and the mine.
Lo, now, we see the tabulated scheme
Of all the earth; its diagram of story;
But not its mysteries of pain and dream,
Its love, its pride, its passion and its glory.
So Fortunes lie on paper and make no sound,