The Hound of Heaven

¹I fled Him, down the nights and down the days;

²I fled Him, down the arches of the years;

³I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways

⁴Of my own mind; and in the mist of tears

⁵I hid from Him, and under running laughter.

⁶Up vistaed hopes I sped;

⁷And shot, precipitated,

⁸Adown Titanic glooms of chasmèd fears,

⁹From those strong Feet that followed, followed after.

¹⁰But with unhurrying chase,

¹¹And unperturbèd pace,

¹²Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,

¹³They beat — and a Voice beat

¹⁴More instant than the Feet —

¹⁵'All things betray thee, who betrayest Me.'

¹⁶I pleaded, outlaw-wise,

¹⁷By many a hearted casement, curtained red,

¹⁸Trellised with intertwining charities;

¹⁹(For, though I knew His love Who followèd,

²⁰Yet was I sore adread

²¹Lest, having Him, I must have naught beside),

²²But, if one little casement parted wide,

²³The gust of His approach would clash it to:

²⁴Fear wist not to evade, as Love wist to pursue.

²⁵Across the margent of the world I fled,

²⁶And troubled the gold gateways of the stars,

²⁷Smiting for shelter on their clangèd bars;

²⁸Fretted to dulcet jars

²⁹And silvern chatter the pale ports o' the moon.

³⁰I said to Dawn: Be sudden — to Eve: Be soon;

³¹With thy young skiey blossoms heap me over

³²From this tremendous Lover —

³³Float thy vague veil about me, lest He see!

³⁴I tempted all His servitors, but to find

³⁵My own betrayal in their constancy,

³⁶In faith to Him their fickleness to me,

³⁷Their traitorous trueness, and their loyal deceit.

³⁸To all swift things for swiftness did I sue;

³⁹Clung to the whistling mane of every wind.

⁴⁰But whether they swept, smoothly fleet,

⁴¹The long savannahs of the blue;

⁴²Or whether, Thunder-driven,

⁴³They clanged his chariot 'thwart a heaven,

⁴⁴Plashy with flying lightnings round the spurn o' their feet: —

⁴⁵Fear wist not to evade as Love wist to pursue.

⁴⁶Still with unhurrying chase,

⁴⁷And unperturbèd pace,

⁴⁸Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,

⁴⁹They beat — and a Voice beat

⁵⁰More instant than the Feet —

⁵¹'Naught shelters thee, who wilt not shelter Me.'

⁵²I sought no more that after which I strayed

⁵³In face of man or maid;

⁵⁴But still within the little children's eyes

⁵⁵Seems something, something that replies,

⁵⁶They at least are for me, surely for me!

⁵⁷I turned me to them very wistfully;

⁵⁸But just as their young eyes grew sudden fair

⁵⁹With dawning answers there,

⁶⁰Their angel plucked them from me by the hair.

⁶¹'Come then, ye other children, Nature's — share

⁶²With me' (said I) 'your delicate fellowship;

⁶³Let me greet you lip to lip,

⁶⁴Let me twine with you caresses,

⁶⁵Wantoning

⁶⁶With our Lady-Mother's vagrant tresses,

⁶⁷Banqueting

⁶⁸With her in her wind-walled palace,

⁶⁹Underneath her azured daïs,

⁷⁰Quaffing, as your taintless way is,

⁷¹From a chalice

⁷²Lucent-weeping out of the dayspring.'

⁷³So it was done:

⁷⁴I in their delicate fellowship was one —

⁷⁵Drew the bolt of Nature's secrecies.

⁷⁶I knew all the swift importings

⁷⁷On the wilful face of skies;

⁷⁸I knew how the clouds arise

⁷⁹Spumèd of the wild sea-snortings;

⁸⁰All that's born or dies

⁸¹Rose and drooped with; made them shapers

⁸²Of mine own moods, or wailful or divine;

⁸³With them joyed and was bereaven.

⁸⁴I was heavy with the even,

⁸⁵When she lit her glimmering tapers

⁸⁶Round the day's dead sanctities.

⁸⁷I laughed in the morning's eyes.

⁸⁸I triumphed and I saddened with all weather,

⁸⁹Heaven and I wept together,

⁹⁰And its sweet tears were salt with mortal mine;

⁹¹Against the red throb of its sunset-heart

⁹²I laid my own to beat,

⁹³And share commingling heat;

⁹⁴But not by that, by that, was eased my human smart.

⁹⁵In vain my tears were wet on Heaven's grey cheek.

⁹⁶For ah! we know not what each other says,

⁹⁷These things and I; in sound I speak —

⁹⁸Their sound is but their stir, they speak by silences.

⁹⁹Nature, poor stepdame, cannot slake my drouth;

¹⁰⁰Let her, if she would owe me,

¹⁰¹Drop yon blue bosom-veil of sky, and show me

¹⁰²The breasts o' her tenderness:

¹⁰³Never did any milk of hers once bless

¹⁰⁴My thirsting mouth.

¹⁰⁵Nigh and nigh draws the chase,

¹⁰⁶With unperturbèd pace,

¹⁰⁷Deliberate speed, majestic instancy;

¹⁰⁸And past those noisèd Feet

¹⁰⁹A voice comes yet more fleet —

¹¹⁰'Lo! naught contents thee, who content'st not Me.'

¹¹¹Naked I wait Thy love's uplifted stroke!

¹¹²My harness piece by piece Thou hast hewn from me,

¹¹³And smitten me to my knee;

¹¹⁴I am defenceless utterly.

¹¹⁵I slept, methinks, and woke,

¹¹⁶And, slowly gazing, find me stripped in sleep.

¹¹⁷In the rash lustihead of my young powers,

¹¹⁸I shook the pillaring hours

¹¹⁹And pulled my life upon me; grimed with smears,

¹²⁰I stand amid the dust o' the mounded years —

¹²¹My mangled youth lies dead beneath the heap.

¹²²My days have crackled and gone up in smoke,

¹²³Have puffed and burst as sun-starts on a stream.

¹²⁴Yea, faileth now even dream

¹²⁵The dreamer, and the lute the lutanist;

¹²⁶Even the linked fantasies, in whose blossomy twist

¹²⁷I swung the earth a trinket at my wrist,

¹²⁸Are yielding; cords of all too weak account

¹²⁹For earth with heavy griefs so overplussed.

¹³⁰Ah! is Thy love indeed

¹³¹A weed, albeit an amaranthine weed,

¹³²Suffering no flowers except its own to mount?

¹³³Ah! must —

¹³⁴Designer infinite! —

¹³⁵Ah! must Thou char the wood ere Thou canst limn with it?

¹³⁶My freshness spent its wavering shower i' the dust;

¹³⁷And now my heart is as a broken fount,

¹³⁸Wherein tear-drippings stagnate, spilt down ever

¹³⁹From the dank thoughts that shiver

¹⁴⁰Upon the sighful branches of my mind.

¹⁴¹Such is; what is to be?

¹⁴²The pulp so bitter, how shall taste the rind?

¹⁴³I dimly guess what Time in mists confounds;

¹⁴⁴Yet ever and anon a trumpet sounds

¹⁴⁵From the hid battlements of Eternity;

¹⁴⁶Those shaken mists a space unsettle, then

¹⁴⁷Round the half-glimpsèd turrets slowly wash again.

¹⁴⁸But not ere him who summoneth

¹⁴⁹I first have seen, enwound

¹⁵⁰With glooming robes purpureal, cypress-crowned;

¹⁵¹His name I know, and what his trumpet saith.

¹⁵²Whether man's heart or life it be which yields

¹⁵³Thee harvest, must Thy harvest-fields

¹⁵⁴Be dunged with rotten death?

¹⁵⁵Now of that long pursuit

¹⁵⁶Comes on at hand the bruit;

¹⁵⁷That Voice is round me like a bursting sea:

¹⁵⁸'And is thy earth so marred,

¹⁵⁹Shattered in shard on shard?

¹⁶⁰Lo, all things fly thee, for thou fliest Me!

¹⁶¹Strange, piteous, futile thing!

¹⁶²Wherefore should any set thee love apart?

¹⁶³Seeing none but I makes much of naught' (He said),

¹⁶⁴'And human love needs human meriting:

¹⁶⁵How hast thou merited —

¹⁶⁶Of all man's clotted clay the dingiest clot?

¹⁶⁷Alack, thou knowest not

¹⁶⁸How little worthy of any love thou art!

¹⁶⁹Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee,

¹⁷⁰Save Me, save only Me?

¹⁷¹All which I took from thee I did but take,

¹⁷²Not for thy harms,

¹⁷³But just that thou might'st seek it in My arms.

¹⁷⁴All which thy child's mistake

¹⁷⁵Fancies as lost, I have stored for thee at home:

¹⁷⁶Rise, clasp My hand, and come!'

¹⁷⁷Halts by me that footfall:

¹⁷⁸Is my gloom, after all,

¹⁷⁹Shade of His hand, outstretched caressingly?

¹⁸⁰'Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest,

¹⁸¹I am He Whom thou seekest!

¹⁸²Thou dravest love from thee, who dravest Me.'