I died and passed from earth and went my way,
I trod the starry gulf from sphere to sphere,
I felt the breath of God upon my brow
As I drew near.
I paused above Infinity’s abyss,
Scanning the upward path my spirit trod;
A million silver planets spun between
The earth and God.
Yet, scarlet on the ether’s inky waves,
The crooked orbit of the earth was cast;
Dark silhouettes against that solemn light,
Its countless creatures passed.
I saw those mortal shadows stumble on,
Rising in anguish, passing in a breath,
Blind atoms, treading their predestined doom
From birth to death.
Upon the smiling mask that Nature wears,
Was writ the blasphemy of human wills;
I saw man’s bloody footprint on the shore,
His hand upon the hills.{45}
I heard his laughter as he passed along,
I heard the mortal boast immortal breath;
I saw the earth in tragic irony,
Plunge to its death.
Then low into Jehovah’s listening ear
I spoke: “O God of Gods, the life you gave
Is but a lying travesty, whose lie
Ends in the grave.
“Look on the lives that you have made and marred,
Filing gray phantoms in a hapless train:
The stronger finds your heaven; the weaker finds
An endless pain.
“O God, within the hollow of whose hand
A million worlds are tossed to win or lose,
You choose the stronger for salvation, but
The damned I choose.
“I take my stand upon the weaker side,
I grasp the sinner’s hand, I share his fate;
The hell of those who failed, I choose, or those
Who win too late.{46}”
God smiled: across the inky ether way,
A flash that lighted worlds supernal fell.
“It is the damned you look upon,” God said:
“The earth is hell.”
{47}