So live, that when thy summons comes to join The innumerable caravan, which moves To that mysterious realm, where each shall take His chamber in the silent halls of death, Thou go not like the quarry-slave at night Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams. RALPH WALDO EMERSON THE SPHINX The Sphinx is drowsy, Her ear is heavy, She broods on the world. "Who'll tell me my secret, The ages have kept?— I awaited the seer, While they slumbered and slept: "The fate of the man-child The meaning of man; Daedalian plan; Out of sleeping a waking, "Erect as a sunbeam, In beautiful motion The thrush plies his wings: Kind leaves of his covert Your silence he sings. "The waves, unashamed, Primordial wholes, Firmly draw, firmly drive, "Sea, earth, air, sound, silence. Plant, quadruped, bird, By one music enchanted, One deity stirred,— Each the other adorning, Accompany still; Night veileth the morning, "The babe by its mother Lies bathed in joy; Glide its hours uncounted The sun is its toy; Shines the peace of all being, And the sun of the world "But man crouches and blushes He creepeth and peepeth, Jealous glancing around, 66 'Out spoke the great mother, Beholding his fear;— At the sound of her accents Cold shuddered the sphere:'Who has drugged my boy's cup? Who has mixed my boy's bread? Who, with sadness and madness, Has turned my child's head?' I heard a poet answer, Aloud and cheerfully, Say on, sweet Sphinx! thy dirges Are pleasant songs to me. Deep love lieth under These pictures of time; They fade in the light of Their meaning sublime. "The fiend that man harries Can't trance him again, "To vision profounder, Man's spirit must dive; His aye-rolling orbit At no goal will arrive; The heavens that now draw him With sweetness untold, Once found,-for new heavens He spurneth the old. "Pride ruined the angels, Their shame them restores; Lurks the joy that is sweetest Have I a lover Who is noble and free? I would he were nobler Than to love me. "Eterne alternation Now follows, now flies; "Dull Sphinx, Jove keep thy five wits. Thy sight is growing blear: Rue, myrrh, and cummin for the SphinxHer muddy eyes to clear!"— The old Sphinx bit her thick lip, Said, "Who taught thee me to name? I am thy spirit, yoke-fellow, Of thine eye I am eyebeam. 'Thou art the unanswered question; Couldst see thy proper eye; Alway it asketh, asketh; And each answer is a lie. |