And hate the song too taught him: hate of all That brings or holds in thrall Of spirit or flesh, free-born ere God began, The holy body and sacred soul of man. And wheresoever a curse was or a chain, A throne for torment or a crown for bane Rose, moulded out of poor men's molten pain, There, said he, should man's heaviest hate be set Inexorably, to faint not or forget Till the last warmth bled forth of the last vein In flesh that none should call a king's again, Seeing wolves and dogs and birds that plague-strike air Leave the last bone of all the carrion bare.
And hope the high song taught him: hope whose eyes Can sound the seas unsoundable, the skies Inaccessible of eyesight; that can see What earth beholds not, hear what wind and sea Hear not, and speak what all these crying in one Can speak not to the sun. For in her sovereign eyelight all things are Clear as the closest seen and kindlier star That marries morn and even and winter and spring With one love's golden ring. For she can see the days of man, the birth Of good and death of evil things on earth Inevitable and infinite, and sure As present pain is, or herself is pure. Yea, she can hear and see, beyond all things That lighten from before Time's thunderous wings Through the awful circle of wheel-winged periods, The tempest of the twilight of all Gods: And higher than all the circling course they ran The sundawn of the spirit that was man.
And fear the song too taught him; fear to be Worthless the dear love of the wind and sea That bred him fearless, like a sea-mew reared In rocks of man's foot feared, Where nought of wingless life may sing or shine. Fear to wax worthless of that heaven he had When all the life in all his limbs was glad And all the drops in all his veins were wine And all the pulses music; when his heart, Singing, bade heaven and wind and sea bear part In one live song's reiterance, and they bore: Fear to go crownless of the flower he wore When the winds loved him and the waters knew, The blithest life that clove their blithe life through With living limbs exultant, or held strife More amorous than all dalliance aye anew With the bright breath and strength of their large life, With all strong wrath of all sheer winds that blew, All glories of all storms of the air that fell Prone, ineluctable, With roar from heaven of revel, and with hue As of a heaven turned hell. For when the red blast of their breath had made All heaven aflush with light more dire than shade, He felt it in his blood and eyes and hair Burn as if all the fires of the earth and air Had laid strong hold upon his flesh, and stung The soul behind it as with serpent's tongue, Forked like the loveliest lightnings: nor could bear But hardly, half distraught with strong delight, The joy that like a garment wrapped him round And lapped him over and under With raiment of great light And rapture of great sound At every loud leap earthward of the thunder From heaven's most furthest bound: So seemed all heaven in hearing and in sight, Alive and mad with glory and angry joy, That something of its marvellous mirth and might Moved even to madness, fledged as even for flight, The blood and spirit of one but mortal boy.