In silence shut with such harmonies near.
What did I know in such dim, narrow sphere
That pressed me around, upon every side!
For if I but stirred in outreaching dream,
Lo! a wall, instead of horizon wide!
For still vaguely I felt the world beyond,
And beat restless wings ’gainst inclosing cell,
In fancies of soaring to other states,
Each one but a larger and brighter shell!
Just a touch when the hour had come at last,
And my house of bondage fell all away!
Then, with opened vision and plumed for flight,
I came forth, new born, to this cloudless day!
Out of my shell! Was I ever confined
Such a weary time in that shattered vase?
What a dungeon frail to entrammel growth!
When endless realm to this freedom displays!
O soul of man, like a bird in the shell,
Thus encompassed by glowing world unseen,
Thou, too, midst eternity’s circling light
In thy prison of flesh hast folded been!
When moment of death deliverance gives,
Then only thou knowest the truth of life,
How small and cramped was thy dwelling of clay
The infinite round with what glories rife!