Part 5

Midnight, Black, and a wild sea of stars, A gold-white surf of stars whose sparkling foam Breaks into waves on occult ether bars, Where star-tides have their deep eternal home. All night the solemn Wonder sweeps me by; Arcturus, Vega, Spica cross the sky On one fixed path, by laws that do not change, Unfailing while all other laws derange.

Midnight, black; and a wild horde of fears, The brains half-knowledge and the hearts fierce pride Questions me cold and distant to my tears; Yet on my thought the old true Visions glide-- Tenderness, Truth, Unselfishness; their lights Travel the wastes and glimmer on the heights. So may I keep my way, whose avatars Gave me a path that leads beyond the Stars.

SOURCE

“If Beauty grows old, share it before it be gone, and if it abides, why fear to give away what thou dost keep?”

By the Alpheus, where the reeds are blown Aslant by winds that flick the tawny current, There runs a path that is all overgrown With low dwarf oaks and many a vine deterrent, Which leads past grain and broad mulberry trees To soft Olympia’s cool sanctities.

There, where the cypress makes a trancelike shade, White pillars gleam, and floors of old mosaic, Hold gemmy moss and tender bud and blade, In hints of bygone Pyrrhic and Trochic-- In those fresh petal rhythms which Nature keeps Like poems living where the poet sleeps.

And all about the place the Games go on. The buoyant clouds fly swift to wingéd races; One tall fir gives an Ode to Marathon, And down the temple paths young sunlight paces; And that strange rare Perfection, that is Greece, Here holds its happy spell of calm and Peace.

Dreaming Olympia, whose footpaths take Their secret way to temple and by column, Thou art so far away. The blue daybreak Is all war-reddened now, and the Vow solemn; Yet, incandescent in those aisles of pines, Thy same still tranquil beauty grayly shines.

And this is well, for after all the pain, And all the hate, and all the human blunder, How we shall need to bathe us once again In baths of pure Greek beauty! Ah! the wonder Hellas has ever held! Shall we not need That wonder to rebuke our shame and greed?

Sylvan Olympia, keep the untouched dream For years to come and for a noble future! Bind all thy classic pathways to one Theme Of Soaring Youth and starward high adventure! So shall thy dusks, when wistful feet come roaming; Mean always--world-pain healed, and spirits homing.

Typographical errors corrected by the etext transcriber:

Marks and the Palazzo Guistizia=> Marks and the Palazzo Giustizia {pg 13}

Giutsizia=> Giustizia {pg 19}

a wierd insistence=> a weird insistence {pg 20}

seista-hour=> siesta-hour {pg 22}

Wecome forestiere=> Welcome forestiere {pg 26}

war corrspondent=> war correspondent {pg 28}

scientic ways=> scientific ways {pg 47}

sends ship and men=> sends ships and men {pg 47}

fluttering Guidecca=> fluttering Giudecca {pg 60}

And gobules=> And globules {pg 76}

habors of the sky=> harbors of the sky {pg 76}

lilting rythm=> lilting rhythm {pg 99}

snowdorps quail=> snowdrops quail {pg 103}

Much lonlier=> Much lonelier {pg 119}