Unrest

A FIERCE unrest seethes at the core

Of all existing things:

It was the eager wish to soar

That gave the gods their wings.

From what flat wastes of cosmic slime,

And stung by what quick fire,

Sunward the restless races climb!—

Men risen out of mire!

There throbs through all the worlds that are

This heart-beat hot and strong,

And shaken systems, star by star,

Awake and glow in song.

But for the urge of this unrest

These joyous spheres are mute;

But for the rebel in his breast

Had man remained a brute.

When baffled lips demanded speech,

Speech trembled into birth—

(One day the lyric word shall reach

From earth to laughing earth.)—

When man’s dim eyes demanded light,

The light he sought was born—

His wish, a Titan, scaled the height

And flung him back the morn!

From deed to dream, from dream to deed,

From daring hope to hope,

The restless wish, the instant need,

Still lashed him up the slope!

……
I sing no governed firmament,

Cold, ordered, regular—

I sing the stinging discontent

That leaps from star to star!