Orpheus

Iam: that darkness strange and uterine Is shot with dawn and scented with the rose ; The deep dim prison-house of corn and wine, Flowers, children, stars, with flame far subtler glows Formless, all-piercing, death-defying, divine, A sweet frail lamp whose shadow gleams and shows No darkness, is as light is where its rays Cross, interweave, and marry with the day’s! I am: the heart that flames from central Me Seeks out all life, and takes again, to mingle Its passion with my might and majesty, Till the vast floods of the man’s being tingle And glow, self-lost within my soul and sea Of love, and sun of utter light, and single Keen many-veinéd heart: our lips and kisses Marry and muse on our immortal blisses. Iam: the greatest and the least : the sole And separate life of things. The mighty stresses Of worlds are my nerves twitching. Branch and bole Of forests waving in deep wildernesses Are hairs upon my body. Rivers roll To make one tear in my superb caresses, When on myself myself begets a child, A system of a thousand planets piled! Iam: the least, the greatest: the frail life Of some small coral-insect still may tremble With love for me, and call me queen and wife; The shy plant of the water may dissemble 103