How all things transitory, all things vain
Desert me! Whither am I sinking slow
On the prone wing, to what predestined home,
What peace beyond all peace, what ultimate joy?
Nay, cease from questioning, care not to know,
Let bliss dissolve each thought, all function cease,
Fold close the wing, let the soft-flowing light
Permeate, and merely once uplift drooped lids
To mark the world remote, the abandoned shore,
Fretted with much vain pleasure, futile pain,
Far, far.
The deepening peace! a dawn of essences
Awful and incommunicably dear!
Grace opening into grace, joy quenching joy!
Thy waves and billows have gone over me
Blissful and calm, and still the dreams drop off,
And true things grow more true, and larger orbs
The strong salvation which has seized my soul.
The stream of the attraction draws me on
Toward some centre; all will quickly end,
All be attained. The sweetness of repose
And this swift motion slay the consciousness
Of being, and bind up the will in sleep.
Silence and light accept my soul—I touch....
Is it death’s centre or the breast of God?