Dominium In Excelsis

Exalt thyself: be more than man, Be saint or be magician, And where the burning Sword awaits Defy the old seraphic ban. Thy will, that climbs from dark estates, Shall divinize the godless fates, This fiery ecstasy of dream Melt down the grim, forbidden gates That open into spheres extreme Beyond the starry-bubbled stream— Beyond Capella, past Altair— Where amaranthine gardens gleam. Thy feet shall tread the Scorpion's lair, Thy hands shall catch the comet's hair; Or over Endor thou shalt ride Unfrighted on the tamed Nightmare. And thence go down where ghosts have died And famished ghouls and vampires glide; Or tarry in years behind the tomb; Or in the multiple futures bide. Thou shalt respire the flame and fume Of Beltis' altars drowned in gloom Under her sharded fanes; or share The fabled Atlantean doom, And rise unharmed to light and air Out of old death, once more to death With antinomian deed and thought The planet of thy slain despair— Till stones and atoms, shadow-wrought, Dissolving shall return to naught, Or into fairer shapes be brought.