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(AFTER HE HAS BEEN EXTEMPORIZING UPON THE MUSICAL INSTRUMENT OF HIS INVENTION)

 

 Would that the structure brave, the manifold music I build,
 

 Bidding my organ obey, calling its keys to their work,
 

 Claiming each slave of the sound, at a touch, as when Solomon willed
 

 Armies of angels that soar, legions of demons that lurk,
 

 Man, brute, reptile, fly,--alien of end and of aim,
 

 Adverse, each from the other heaven-high, hell-deep removed,--
 

 Should rush into sight at once as he named the ineffable Name,
 

 And pile him a palace straight, to pleasure the princess he loved!
 

Would it might tarry like his, the beautiful building of mine,
This which my keys in a crowd pressed and importuned to raise! 10
Ah, one and all, how they helped, would dispart now and now combine,
Zealous to hasten the work, heighten their master his praise!
And one would bury his brow with a blind plunge down to hell,
Burrow awhile and build, broad on the roots of things,
Then up again swim into sight, having based me my palace well,
Founded it, fearless of flame, flat on the nether springs.

And another would mount and march, like the excellent minion he was,
Ay, another and yet another, one crowd but with many a crest,
Raising my rampired walls of gold as transparent as glass, 19
Eager to do and die, yield each his place to the rest: 20
For higher still and higher (as a runner tips with fire,
When a great illumination surprises a festal night–
Outlining round and round Rome’s dome from space to spire) 23
Up, the pinnacled glory reached, and the pride of my soul was in sight.

In sight? Not half! for it seemed, it was certain, to match man’s birth,
Nature in turn conceived, obeying an impulse as I;
And the emulous heaven yearned down, made effort to reach the earth.
As the earth had done her best, in my passion, to scale the sky:
Novel splendours burst forth, grew familiar and dwelt with mine.
Not a point nor peak but found and fixed its wandering star; 30
Meteor-moons, balls of blaze: and they did not pale nor pine,
For earth had attained to heaven, there was no more near nor far.

Nay more; for there wanted not who walked, in the glare and glow,
Presences plain in the place; or, fresh, from the Protoplast,
Furnished for ages to come, when a kindlier wind should blow,
Lured now to begin and live, in a house to their liking at last:
Or else the wonderful Dead who have passed thro’ the body and gone,
But were back once more to breathe in an old world worth their new:
What never had been, was now; what was, as it shall be anon;
And what is,–shall I say, matched both? for I was made perfect too.

All thro’ my keys that gave their sounds to a wish of my soul,
All thro’ my soul that praised as its wish flowed visibly forth,
All thro’ music and me! For think, had I painted the whole,
Why, there it had stood, to see, nor the process so wonder-worth:
Had I written the same, made verse–still, effect proceeds from cause,
Ye know why the forms are fair, ye hear how the tale is told;
It is all triumphant art, but art in obedience to laws,
Painter and poet are proud, in the artist-list enrolled:–