Iv

Did the cold Norns who pattern life With haste and rest Take thought to cheer their pilgrims on Through trackless twilights vast and wan, Across the failure and the strife, From quest to quest,--

Set their last kiss upon thy face, And let thee go To tell the haunted whisperings Of unimaginable things, Which plague thy fellows with a trace They cannot know?

So they might fashion and send forth Their house of doom, Through the pale splendor of the night, In vibrant, hurled, impetuous flight, A resonant meteor of the North From gloom to gloom.