Ambergris

32 AMBERGRIS Fresh fountains of sweet water that endure Assume the crown of the wide world, and lend A star of many summits to his head That rules his fate and compasses his end, And seeks the holy mountain of the dead To draw dead fire, and breathe, and give it life ! But thou, be strong for strife, And, as a god, cry out, and let there be The mark of many footsteps on the sea Of angels hastening to fulfil Thy supreme, single will ! Alone, intense, unmoved, not made for change, Let thy one godhead rise To move like morning, and like day to range, A furnace for the skies, That all men cry : The uncreated God ! Formless, ineffable, just, whose period Is as his name, Eternity ! So bear The sceptre of the air ! So mayest thou avenge, all-seeing, blind, The wrath of this consuming fire, that licks The rafters and the portals of the house, The gateways of the kingdom, where behind Lurk ruinous fates and consequence ; where fix Their fangs the scorpions ; where hide their brows The shamed protectors of the Egyptian land. Go forth avenging ; men shall understand And worship, seeing justice as a spouse Lean on thine iron hand. For Murder walks by night, and hides her face, But righteous Wrath in the light, and knows his place ; For hate of a mother is ill, and the lightning flashes But foil a harlot’s will, burn the earth to ashes, Cleanse the incestuous sty of a whore’s desire Scatter the dung to the sky, and burn her with fire ! So the avenging master shall cleanse his fate of shame, Set his seal of disaste, a royal seal to his name.