The Veiled Isis

Ἐγὼ εἰμὶ πᾶν τὸ γεγονὸς καὶ ὂν καὶ ἐσόμενον καὶ τὸν ἐμὸν πέπλον οὐδείς πω θνητὸς ἀπεκάλυψε.

Now know I that the white-winged hours of heaven ’Twixt me and thee in endless retinue, Each after each, shall pass; nor ever pause To lift the least light corner of thy veil, Or grant thine eyes to mine. O hidden One, Supreme-set Mother of all mystery, And myriad-named of men, now know I well Thou dost endure us but a moment’s span Upon thy heaving bosom to behold The wonder of thy movement, at thy grace To fall and worship--ay, we know not what! And then, or ever thou hast heard, to fall And pass, remembering ourselves and thee No more. O strange, O unassailable, Thou that with myriad bright play of eyes Provokest our desire, thy seamless robe, Set close about for our bewilderment, Folds thee in perfect proof. For I have toiled And tarried long by thy familiar ways, Have known thee going out and coming in, And watched thy daily wont; have felt the flame Flash from thy face almost to scathe mine eyes, And heard at night thy breath about my ears Beat, and pass quickly by; yea, I have tracked Thy fingers in and out through woven clouds, And passionless ebb and flow of waves and streams, And rockings of the air, only to know The weft is woven without any flaw From flight of stars to atoms: rent is none, No gap, no visionary gleam, and Thou Art hid for ever. Therefore now, once more, I see the Spring descend upon the Earth-- The new life quivering upwards into light; I see the plaited green on plant and tree Slide from the soil and break the knotted bark; The grey elm quickens with a strange delight; The golden chestnut-buds against the blue Gleam like a thousand lamps; and melody Thrills through the woodland air. O now once more The primal splendour of the sun returns With a most welcome triumph. Thorn and may Stand white with bridal blossom unto him; The ground is cloven and the sleeping flowers Have heard and known their lord: through wood and dell Yellow primroses leap and peer to heaven-- He rideth by begirt with azure wings-- And bloom and beauty multitudinous Break on his path. The violet stands by Glad in her grassy covert. In the meads Like angel hosts white daisies wave their wings, And as he passes bend like one and rise, And, while he fires with light the Western lands, Close their bright eyes and blush for very joy. Once more o’er vale and mountain do I hear The voice of Spring’s sweet trouble: nightingales And thrushes in the thicket numberless Tremble to utter on the quiet air The mystery of eve; where all night Earth, Orbed in her dreams of star-related life, Floats in a flood of moonlight and of dew. Once more I see it all, and, seeing, know The infinite of beauty--how thy world Is charactered with wisdom: each winged sense Faints with the weight of wonder, till I walk Like one enchanted to a magic sound, A king whose eyes are feasted with a play Of endless scenic change, a child to whom Earth has no bounds for joy. And yet, ah! yet, Deeper than all, and deeper than my joy, Thou whom I know, nor yet can ever see, Thou, mother Isis, mother over all, Thou radiant life and one Reality, Vanishest for ever: like the Northern beam Decking the far-off mountains, all untouched, Unheard, inviolable, Thou movest on In the great silence of our hearts, through leaf And bud and fairy bloom fleeting for aye Wherever we are not. And though our spirits Burst through their woven chambers till the heart Ache for the stress of passion; though our dreams Be girt about with one dull cloud of death For hope that cannot pierce; yea, though our eyes For gazing vainly on thy vanishings Waste away in their orbits; yet at last We fall, our arms stretched outward on the earth And features folded in the clay-cold ground, Nor e’er behold thee face to face at all.

ROME, 1873.