Voices
by
Earthquake.
I am a memory of cosmogony,
That first great hour of travail when the voice
Of God called suns and systems from the void;
I am the dream He dreams of that last day
When mountains by the roots shall be plucked up
And headlong flung into the raging sea!
Hurricane.
I am the breath that fills the organ pipes
When through the vast cathedral of the world
Death’s stormy threnody sweeps, wave on wave,
The symboled note that one day will be blown
By a great angel standing in the sun,
At which the heaven and earth shall pass away!
Fire.
I am the letters of that fateful word
Writ with a flaming sword above the gates
Of Eden when God spelled the doom of man;
I am the wrath that on the judgment day
Shall waste the seas, and wither up the stars,
And roll the heavens together like a scroll!
God.
I am the earthquake, hurricane and fire!
Through them I speak with man as through the stars,
The dews, the flowers, and every gentler thing;
Some learn my lesson in the paths of peace;
Some con it low at desolation’s knee;
Only the fool hath said: “There is no God!”