Iii

Oh Sun, that yet will my spring thoughts astound, How often this lone mendicant you found Stripped in your presence of all earthly things. A happy dervish whirling round and round.

You were his tree of incense and his feast, You were his wagon and his harnessed beast, His singing brother, yet his tyrant hard, With whip and spur and shout that never ceased.

He thought of Freedom that rides round with you Healing the nations with a crystal dew, The comrade of your car, with Science there, Making the ways of men forever new.

Would we might lift a mighty battle-cry. Nations and mendicants, and shake your sky: Would that you caught us singing as one man That song I sang when begging days began Hearing it in every beam on high: “Man’s spirit-darkness shall forever die.”