WAS it light that spake from the darkness, <br /> or music that shone from the word, <br /> When the night was enkindled with sound <br /> of the sun or the first-born bird? <br />Souls enthralled and entrammelled in bondage <br /> of seasons that fall and rise, <br />Bound fast round with the fetters of flesh, <br /> and blinded with light that dies, <br />Lived not surely till music spake, <br /> and the spirit of life was heard. <br /> <br /> Music, sister of sunrise, and herald of life to be, <br /> Smiled as dawn on the spirit of man, <br /> and the thrall was free. <br />Slave of nature and serf of time, <br /> the bondman of life and death, <br />Dumb with passionless patience that breathed <br /> but forlorn and reluctant breath, <br />Heard, beheld, and his soul made answer, <br /> and communed aloud with the sea. <br /> <br /> Morning spake, and he heard: <br /> and the passionate silent noon <br /> Kept for him not silence: <br /> and soft from the mounting moon <br />Fell the sound of her splendour, <br /> heard as dawn's in the breathless night, <br />Not of men but of birds whose note <br /> bade man's soul quicken and leap to light: <br />And the song of it spake, and the light and the darkness <br /> of earth were as chords in tune.<br /><br />Algernon Charles Swinburne<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/music-an-ode/
