Collected Works (Vol. II)

600 605 610 615 ASCENSION DAY 159 Tending to final bliss—to stir heaven suffers Some life to better life, this pain swing fore. Is needful: that I grant again. proaches of Did they at last in glory live, bard. Satan and Judas ® might forgive The middle time of misery, Forgive the wrong creation first Or evolution’s iron key Did them—provided they are passed Beyond all change and pain at last Out of this universe accurst. But otherwise! I lift my voice, Deliberately take my choice Promethean, eager to rejoice, In the grim protest’s joy to revel Betwixt Iscariot and the Devil, Throned in their midst! No pain to feel, Tossed on some burning bed of steel, But theirs: My soul of love should swell And, on those piteous floors they trod, Feel, and make God feel, out of Hell, Across the gulf impassable, That He was damned and I was God! Ay! Let him rise and answer me. Ethical and That false creative Deity, eloquent de- Whence came his right to rack the Earth Christian Cos- With pangs of death,” disease, and birth : mogony. No joy unmarred by pain and grief: Insult on injury heaped high In that quack-doctor infamy The Panacea of—Belief ! Only the selfish soul of man Could ever have conceived a plan Man only of all life to embrace, One planet of all stars to place Alone before the Father’s face ; Forgetful of creation’s stain, Forgetful of creation’s pain, Not dumb !—forgetful of the pangs Whereby each life laments and hangs, (Now as I speak a lizard TM lies In wait for light-bewildered flies)