I have boldly dared to plan
The refashioning of Man,—
—<g>There's</g> my work,—Sin's image grown,
Whom God moulded in His own.—
Forth! to wider fields away!
Here's no room for battle-play!
[Going; but pauses as he sees Agnes by
the beach.]
See, she listens by the shore,
As to airy songs afloat.
So she listen'd in the boat
As the stormy surge it tore,—
Listening, to the thwart she clung,—
Listening still, the sea-foam hoar
From her open forehead flung.
'Tis as though her ear were changing
Function, and her eye were listening.
[He approaches.]
Maiden, is it o'er those glistening
Reaches that your eye is ranging?
Agnes.
[Without turning round.]
Neither those nor aught of earth;
Nothing of them I descry.
But a greater earth there gleams
Sharply outlined on the sky,
Foaming floods and spreading streams,
Mists and sunshine breaking forth.
Scarlet-shafted flames are playing
Over cloud-capp'd mountain heads,
And an endless desert spreads,
Whereupon great palms are swaying
In the bitter-breathing blast.
Swart the shadows that they cast.
Nowhere any living thing;
