55. The Hour Of The King

George William Russell

WHO would think this quiet breather
From the world had taken flight?
Yet within the form we see there
Wakes the Golden King to-night.


Out upon the face of faces
He looked forth before his sleep:
Now he knows the starry races
Haunters of the ancient deep.


On the Bird of Diamond Glory
Floats in mystic floods of song:
As he lists Time’s triple story
Seems but as a day is long.


From the mightier Adam falling
To his image dwarfed in clay,
He will at our voices calling
Come to this side of the day.


When he wakes, the dreamy-hearted,
He will know not whence he came,
And the light from which he parted
Be the seraph’s sword of flame,


And behind it hosts supernal
Guarding the lost paradise,
And the tree of life eternal
From the weeping human eyes.

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