Histrion

No man hath dared to write this thing as yet,

And yet i know, how that the souls of all men great

At times pass through us,

And we are melted into them, and are not

Save reflexions of their souls.

Thus am I Dante for a space and am

One François Villon, ballad-lord and thief

Or am such holy ones i may not write,

Lest blasphemy be writ against my name;

This for an instant and the flame is gone.

‘Tis as in midmost us there glows a sphere

Translucent, molten gold, that is the “I”

And into this some form projects itself:

Christus, or John, or eke the Florentine

And as the clear space is not if a form’s

Imposed thereon,

So cease we from all being for the time,

And these, the Masters of the Soul, live on.