The Reef

My green aquarium of phantom fish,Goggling in on me through the misty panes;My rotting leaves and fields spongy with rains;My few clear quiet autumn days--I wish

I could leave all, clearness and mistiness;Sodden or goldenly crystal, all too still.Yes, and I too rot with the leaves that fillThe hollows in the woods; I am grown less

Than human, listless, aimless as the greenIdiot fishes of my aquarium,Who loiter down their dim tunnels and comeAnd look at me and drift away, nought seen

Or understood, but only glazedlyReflected. Upwards, upwards through the shadows,Through the lush sponginess of deep-sea meadowsWhere hare-lipped monsters batten, let me ply

Winged fins, bursting this matrix dark to findJewels and movement, mintage of sunlightScattered largely by the profuse wind,And gulfs of blue brightness, too deep for sight.

Free, newly born, on roads of music and airSpeeding and singing, I shall seek the placeWhere all the shining threads of water race,Drawn in green ropes and foamy meshes. There,

On the red fretted ramparts of a towerOf coral rooted in the depths, shall breakAn endless sequence of joy and speed and power:Green shall shatter to foam; flake with white flake

Shall create an instant's shining constellationUpon the blue; and all the air shall beFull of a million wings that swift and freeLaugh in the sun, all power and strong elation.

Yes, I shall seek that reef, which is beyondAll isles however magically sleepingIn tideless seas, uncharted and unconnedSave by blind eyes; beyond the laughter and weeping

That brood like a cloud over the lands of men.Movement, passion of colour and pure wings,Curving to cut like knives--these are the thingsI search for:--passion beyond the ken

Of our foiled violences, and, more swiftThan any blow which man aims against time,The invulnerable, motion that shall riftAll dimness with the lightning of a rhyme,

Or note, or colour. And the body shall beQuick as the mind; and will shall find releaseFrom bondage to brute things; and joyouslySoul, will and body, in the strength of triune peace,

Shall live the perfect grace of power unwasted.And love consummate, marvellously blendingPassion and reverence in a single springOf quickening force, till now never yet tasted,

But ever ceaselessly thirsted for, shall crownThe new life with its ageless starry fire.I go to seek that reef, far down, far downBelow the edge of everyday's desire,

Beyond the magical islands, where of oldI was content, dreaming, to give the lieTo misery. They were all strong and boldThat thither came; and shall I dare to try?