FIVE SONNETS RELATING TO BEAUTY.
I.
I dreamed an angel, Angel twice, through death,
Wrought us another "Night." A stately dream,
Where reconciling Infinites did seem
To fold round life's perplexities, and wreath
Its ancient glooms with stars:—a marble breath
From Art's serene, fresh, everlasting morn,
Where the dull worm of earthly pain is born
To winged life thenceforth, and busieth
With golden messages its mortal hours.
O the Divine, earth would have wronged and slain!
Its pangs are rays above her falling towers
Of lovelier truth—breaths of a sweet disdain
Shedding strange nothingness on meaner pain,
Drops of the bleeding god that turn to flowers.
Wrought us another "Night." A stately dream,
Where reconciling Infinites did seem
To fold round life's perplexities, and wreath
Its ancient glooms with stars:—a marble breath
From Art's serene, fresh, everlasting morn,
Where the dull worm of earthly pain is born
To winged life thenceforth, and busieth
With golden messages its mortal hours.
O the Divine, earth would have wronged and slain!
Its pangs are rays above her falling towers
Of lovelier truth—breaths of a sweet disdain
Shedding strange nothingness on meaner pain,
Drops of the bleeding god that turn to flowers.
