Or on the mast-head sign the wrath to be.

As o'er that ancient weird Arlesian plain
Where Zeus hail'd boulder-stones on the giant crew,
And changed to stone, or slew,
No bud may burgeon in Spring's gracious rain,
No blade of grass or grain:
--So bare, so scourged, a prey to chaos cast
The wisest despot leaves his realm at last!
Though for the land he toil'd with iron will,
Earnest to reach persuasion's goal through power,
The fruit without the flower!
And pray'd and wrestled to charm good from ill;
Waking perchance, or not, in death,--to find
Man fights a losing fight who fights mankind!

And as who in the Theban avenue,
Sphinx ranged by Sphinx, goes awestruck, nor may read
That ancient awful creed
Closed in their granite calm:--so dim the clue,
So tangled, tracking through
That labyrinthine soul which, day by day
Changing, yet kept one long imperious way:
Strong in his weakness; confident, yet forlorn;
Waning and waxing; diamond-keen, or dull,
As that star Wonderful,
Mira, for ever, dying and reborn:--
Blissful or baleful, yet a Power throughout,
Throned in dim altitude o'er the common rout.