This was my dream: I saw a Forest
Old as the earth, no track nor trace
Of unmade man. Thou, Soul, explorest,
Though in a trembling rapture, space
Immeasurable! Shrubs, turned trees,
Trees that touch heaven, support its frieze
Studded with sun and moon and star:
While, oh, the enormous growths that bar
Mine eye from penetrating past
Their tangled twins where lurks, nay, lives
Royally lone, some brute-type cast
I the rough, time cancels, man forgives.
On, Soul! I saw a lucid City
Of architectural device
Every way perfect. Pause for pity,
Lightning! nor leave a cicatrice
On those bright marbles, dome and spire,
Structures palatial, streets which mire
Dares not defile, paved all too fine
For human footsteps smirch, not thine,
Proud soli...