Oracles

ON WAIKIKI BEACH I07 So deep the sense of beauty, and so keen ! The calm abiding holiness of love Reigns ; and so fallen from the heights above Immeasurable, the influence unseen Of music and of spiritual fire, That the soul sleeps, forgotten of desire, Only remembering its God-like birth Reflected in the deity of earth, Becometh even as God. The pensive period Of night and day beats like a waving fan No more, no more : the years, Reft of their joys and fears, Pass like pale faces, leave the life of man Untroubled of their destines, Leave him forgotten of life and time, immortal, calm and wise. Only the ceaseless surf on coral towers, The changeless change of the unchanging ocean, Laps the bright night, with unsubstantial motion Winnowing the starlight, plumed with feathery flowers Of foam and phosphor glory, the strange glow Of the day’s amber fallen to indigo, Lit of its own depth in some subtle wise, A pavement for the footsteps from the skies Of angels walking thus Not all unseen of us, Nor all unknown, nor unintelligible, When with souls lifted up