28.10.2007, 13:01
THE WINGED SOUL.
MY soul is like some cage-born bird, that hath
A restless prescience howsoever won
Of a broad pathway leading to the sun,
With promptings of an oft-reproved faith
In sun-ward yearnings. Stricken though her breast,
And faint her wing, with beating at the bars
Of sense, she looks beyond outlying stars
And only in the Infinite sees rest.
Sad soul ! If ever thy desire be bent
Or broken to thy doom, and made to share
The ruminant's beatitude, content,
Chewing the cud of knowledge, with no care
For germs of life within ; then will I say,
Thou art not caged, but fitly stalled in clay !
MY soul is like some cage-born bird, that hath
A restless prescience howsoever won
Of a broad pathway leading to the sun,
With promptings of an oft-reproved faith
In sun-ward yearnings. Stricken though her breast,
And faint her wing, with beating at the bars
Of sense, she looks beyond outlying stars
And only in the Infinite sees rest.
Sad soul ! If ever thy desire be bent
Or broken to thy doom, and made to share
The ruminant's beatitude, content,
Chewing the cud of knowledge, with no care
For germs of life within ; then will I say,
Thou art not caged, but fitly stalled in clay !