COLOSSAL orb of space, <br />Sparkling with diamond <br />Of countless star on star, <br />All whirling with wild grace <br />In their enwoven dance <br />Illimitably far, <br />What lies beyond <br />Your vasty hollow girdled by that bright <br />River of stellar spray <br />We call the Milky Way? <br />Immeasurable ball, <br />Cornpassed and clasped in light, <br />Can you be all, <br />A flock of fireflies circling in the night, <br />A maze of jewels that the toss of Chance <br />Let fall, <br />Sun, planet, asteroid, <br />One globe of glories in the utter void? <br />What lies beyond? <br />Does the sheer Dark immerse <br />Infinity, drowning the last faint gold <br />Of fleeting comets, lost and vagabond? <br />Or is this astral universe, <br />All that our utmost vision may behold, <br />But one amidst a host of star-strewn spheres, <br />Each zoned with its own stream <br />Of softer gleam, <br />Perchance each dowered with wonder, love and tears? <br />What lies beyond? <br />The puny human heart still stirs <br />Against those flaming barriers, <br />That proud, impenetrable dome <br />Of fire and ether, seeking for a home, <br />A Soul that shall respond <br />To all its questions, longings and despairs. <br />Is space but raiment that the Spirit wears, <br />A gem-embroidered mantle to conceal <br />And yet reveal <br />In splendors of surprise <br />Beauty ineffable, <br />Immanuel? <br />Or shall we rise, <br />Higher than dream of Dante ever trod, <br />From star to star, from empyrean on <br />To empyrean, till the sun that shone <br />Over our vexed mortality be wan, <br />Through life on life, eternal range <br />From form to form, from change to change, <br />To find the Unknown God?<br /><br />Katharine Lee Bates<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/beyond-35/
