No More Learning

_ And one--

_Zerah. _ Has also sinned.
And yet (O marvel! ) doth the Spirit-wind
Blow white those waters? Death upon his face
Is rather shine than shade,
A tender shine by looks beloved made:
He seemeth dying in a quiet place,
And less by iron wounds in hands and feet
Than heart-broke by new joy too sudden and sweet.

_Ador. _ And ONE! --

_Zerah. _ And ONE! --

_Ador. _ Why dost thou pause?

_Zerah. _ God! God!
Spirit of my spirit!
who movest
Through seraph veins in burning deity
To light the quenchless pulses! --

_Ador. _ But hast trod
The depths of love in thy peculiar nature,
And not in any thou hast made and lovest
In narrow seraph hearts! --

_Zerah. _ Above, Creator!
Within, Upholder!

_Ador. _ And below, below,
The creature's and the upholden's sacrifice!

_Zerah. _ Why do I pause? --

_Ador. _ There is a silentness
That answers thee enow,
That, like a brazen sound
Excluding others, doth ensheathe us round,--
Hear it. It is not from the visible skies
Though they are still,
Unconscious that their own dropped dews express
The light of heaven on every earthly hill.
It is not from the hills, though calm and bare
They, since their first creation,
Through midnight cloud or morning's glittering air
Or the deep deluge blindness, toward the place
Whence thrilled the mystic word's creative grace,
And whence again shall come
The word that uncreates,
Have lift their brows in voiceless expectation.
It is not from the places that entomb
Man's dead, though common Silence there dilates
Her soul to grand proportions, worthily
To fill life's vacant room.
Not there: not there.