Archibald Lampman - Alcyone lyrics

In the silent depth of space, Immeasurably old, immeasurably far, Glittering with a silver flame Through eternity, Rolls a great and burning star, With a noble name, Alcyone! In the glorious chart of heaven It is marked the first of seven; 'Tis a Pleiad: And a hundred years of earth With their long-forgotten deeds have come and gone, Since that tiny point of light, Once a splendour fierce and bright, Had its birth In the star we gaze upon. It has travelled all that time-- Thought has not a swifter flight-- Through a region where no faintest gust Of life comes ever, but the power of night Dwells stupendous and sublime, Limitless and void and lonely, A region mute with age, and peopled only With the dead and ruined dust Of worlds that lived eternities ago. Man! when thou dost think of this, And what our earth and its existence is, The half-blind toils since life began, The little aims, the little span, With what pa**ion and what pride, And what hunger fierce and wide, Thou dost break beyond it all, Seeking for the spirit unconfined In the clear abyss of mind A shelter and a peace majestical. For what is life to thee, Turning toward the primal light, With that stern and silent face, If thou canst not be Something radiant and august as night, Something wide as space? Therefore with a love and gratitude divine Thou shalt cherish in thine heart for sign A vision of the great and burning star, Immeasurably old, immeasurably far, Surging forth its silver flame Through eternity; And thine inner heart shall ring and cry With the music strange and high, The grandeur of its name Alcyone!