Child now, or Man, was it who thus beguiled?—

Even as I looked on him, Love, waxing slowly,

Grew as a little cloud, floating enisled,

Which spreads out aloft in the blue sky till solely

It fills the deep ether tremendous in height,

With far-flashing snow-peaks and pinnacles wholly

[79]

Invisible, vanishing light within light.

So changing waxed Love—till he towered before me,

Outgrowing my lost gods in stature and might.

As he grew, as he drew me, a great awe came o'er me,

And stammering, I shook as I questioned his name;

But gently bowed o'er me, he soothèd and bore me,

Yea, bore once again to the haunts whence I came,

By dark ways and dreary, by rough roads and gritty,

To the penfolds of sin, to the purlieus of shame.

And lo, as we went through the woe-clouded city,

Where women bring forth and men labour in vain,

Weak Love grew so great in his passion of pity

That all who beheld him were born once again.

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