The Secret Splendour

In cloud-suspense the faint breeze died;

A deep glow spread on every side:

The firmamental hush came down,

A mirrored soul of aureate brown

Subduing each form-shade to one

Pervasive ecstasy of sun.

No leaf-stir and no flitting mood

Profaned the holy quietude

In which the strange responding earth

Travailed with some miraculous birth—

As though a presence richly far,

Flowering like a vague gold star,

Trembled within her undefiled

Womb-vision—a shadowless spirit-child

Whose splendour of futurity

Would celebrate in mortally

The secret hour when, on the dazzled clay,

Like an eternal lover silence lay.

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