After Nine Years

To Joseph Mazzini.     Prim dicte mihi, summ dicende Camen. 1.     The shadows fallen of years are nine     Since heaven grew seven times more divine     With thy soul entering, and the dearth     Of souls on earth     Grew sevenfold sadder, wanting One     Whose light of life, quenched here and done,     Burns there eternal as the sun. 2.     Beyond all word, beyond all deed,     Beyond all thought beloved, what need     Has death or love that speech should be,     Hast thou of me?     I had no word, no prayer, no cry,     To praise or hail or mourn thee by,     As when thou too wast man as I. 3.     Nay, never, nor as any born     Save one whose name priests turn to scorn,     Who haply, though we know not now,     Was man as thou,     A wanderer branded with men's blame,     Loved past man's utterance: yea, the same,     Perchance, and as his name thy name. 4.     Thou wast as very Christnot he     Degraded into Deity,     And priest-polluted by such prayer     As poisons air,     Tongue-worship of the tongue that slays,     False faith and parricidal praise:     But the man crowned with suffering days. 5.     God only, being of all mankind     Most manlike, of most equal mind     And heart most perfect, more than can     Be heart of man     Once in ten ages, born to be     As haply Christ was, and as we     Knew surely, seeing, and worshipped thee. 6.     To know theethis at least was ours,     God, clothed upon with human hours,     O face beloved, O spirit adored,     Saviour and lord!     That wast not only for thine own     Redeemernot of these alone     But all to whom thy word was known. 7.     Ten years have wrought their will with me     Since last my words took wing for thee     Who then wast even as now above     Me, and my love.     As then thou knewest not scorn, so now     With that beloved benignant brow     Take these of him whose light wast thou.