New Year's Eve

"I have finished another year," said God,      "In grey, green, white, and brown;     I have strewn the leaf upon the sod,     Sealed up the worm within the clod,      And let the last sun down."     "And what's the good of it?" I said.      "What reasons made you call     From formless void this earth we tread,     When nine-and-ninety can be read      Why nought should be at all?     "Yea, Sire; why shaped you us, 'who in      This tabernacle groan' -     If ever a joy be found herein,     Such joy no man had wished to win      If he had never known!"     Then he: "My labours - logicless -      You may explain; not I:     Sense-sealed I have wrought, without a guess     That I evolved a Consciousness      To ask for reasons why.     "Strange that ephemeral creatures who      By my own ordering are,     Should see the shortness of my view,     Use ethic tests I never knew,      Or made provision for!"     He sank to raptness as of yore,      And opening New Year's Day     Wove it by rote as theretofore,     And went on working evermore      In his unweeting way.     1906.