The Equinox (Volume I, Number V)

THE RITE OF SOL Shrined in exceeding glory, eremite, The tortoise skies in sombre carapaces Await the expression and the hour of birth In silence through the adamantine girth. I rose in glory, gathered of the foam. The sea’s flower folded, charioting me risen Where dawn‘s rose stole from its pearlvglimmering home, And heaven laughed, and earth: and mine old prison, The seas that lay beneath the mighty dome, Shone with my splendour. Light did first bedizen Earth with its clusters of fiery dew and spray, When I looked forth and cried, “ It is the day!” The stars are dewdrops on my bosom’s space; The sun and moon are glances through my lashes, Long, tender rays of night ; my subtle face Burns through the sky-dusk, lightens, fills, and flashes With solemn joy and laughter οἱlove; the grace Of all my body swaying stoops and dashes Swift to the daisy’s dawn of love: and swiftest, 0 Spirit of man, when unto me thou liftest! Dawn shakes the molten fire of my delight From the fine flower and fragrance of my tresses! Sunset bids darken all my body’s light, Mixing its music with the sad caresses Of the whole world: I wheel in Wingless flight Through lampless space, the starless wildernesses! Beyond the universal bounds that roll, There is the shrine and image of my soul. I am Nature and God : I reign, I am, alone. None odzer may abide apart: they perish, Drawn into me, into my being grown. None other bosom is. to bear, to nourish, To be: the heart of all beneath my zone Of blue and gold is scarlet-bright to cherish My own life’s being, that is, and is not other ; For I am God and Nature and thy Motherr f 75