III.
             
        O Sorrow, cruel fellowship,
            O Priestess in the vaults of Death,
            O sweet and bitter in a breath,
        What whispers from thy lying lip?

        ‘The stars,’ she whispers, ‘blindly run;
            A web is wov’n across the sky;
            From out waste places comes a cry,
        And murmurs from the dying sun:

        ‘And all the phantom, Nature, stands–
            With all the music in her tone,
            A hollow echo of my own,–
        A hollow form with empty hands.’

        And shall I take a thing so blind,
            Embrace her as my natural good;
            Or crush her, like a vice of blood,
        Upon the threshold of the mind?