The Question

I shall lie so one day, With lips of Silence set; Eyes that no tear can wet Again: a thing of Clay.

I shall lie so, and Earth Will seize again her dust-- Though she must gnaw and rust The coffin's iron girth.

I shall lie so--and they Who still the Day bestride, Will stand so by my side And with sad yearning say:

"What is he now, this man, Shut in a pallor there, His spirit that could dare, What--what now is its span?

"A withered atom's space Within a withered brain? Or can it from the Wain To far Orion race?"

And, like all that have died, I shall but answer--naught. Yet Time this truth has taught: The Question--will abide.