Hurrying, wailing, questing, seeing the moon
Light that waste of beauty and terror and plangent sound;
Knowing the tide creeps on, and that soon, too soon,
All of the torches and all of the flowers lie drowned

Yet that that sea moves not of its movement only,
All of the dim vast force is motes that blend,
Each still striving and still secure and lonely
Unto some end, some great mysterious end.

You who were never afraid of truth or doubt--
Granted that truth we know!--oh, eyes of mine,
Eyes in my soul that will never glimmer out,--
This is my soul's ebb-tide, but I make the Sign!


COWARD

By her beauty stayed, by her love empowered,
(_Coward! Coward!_)
Take the honest light and pray for grace.
Where her lightning struck, where her pureness flowered,
(_Coward! Coward!_)
Dare to see her face.

Through the sea of lies--skies have always lowered!--
(_Coward! Coward!_)
Be she your horizon or your mist,
Make straight on, though dawn be still undowered,