358. Immortality

AGE cannot reach me where the veils of God

Have shut me in,

For me the myriad births of stars and suns

Do but begin,

And here how fragrantly there blows to me

The holy breath,

Sweet from the flowers and stars and hearts of men.

From life and death.

We are not old, O heart, we are not old,

The breath that blows

The soul aflame is still a wandering wind

That comes and goes;

And the stirred heart with sudden raptured life

A moment glows.

A moment here—a bulrush’s brown head

In the grey rain,

A moment there—a child drowned and a heart

Quickened with pain;

The name of Death, the blue deep heaven, the scent

Of the salt sea,

The spicy grass, the honey robbed

From the wild bee.

Awhile we walk the world on its wide roads

And narrow ways,

And they pass by, the countless shadowy troops

Of nights and days;

We know them not, O happy heart,

For you and I

Watch where within a slow dawn lightens up

Another sky.