Bad Dreams: III

THIS was my dream: I saw a Forest Old as the earth, no track nor trace Of unmade man. Thou, Soul, explorest- Though in a trembling rapture- space Immeasurable! Shrubs, turned trees, Trees that touch heaven, support its frieze Studded with sun and moon and star: While- oh, the enormous growths that bar Mine eye from penetrating past Their tangled twine where lurks- nay, lives Royally lone, some brute-type cast I' the rough, time cancels, man forgives. On, Soul! I saw a lucid City Of architectural device Every way perfect. Pause for pity, Lightning! nor leave a cicatrice On those bright marbles, dome and spire, Structures palatial,- streets which mire Dares not defile, paved all too fine For human footstep's smirch, not thine- Proud solitary traverser, My Soul, of silent lengths of way- With what ecstatic dread, aver, Lest life start sanctioned by the stay! Ah, but the last sight was the hideous! A City, yes,- a Forest, true,- But each devouring each. Perfidious Snake-plants had strangled what I knew Was a pavilion once: each oak Held on his horns some spoil he broke By surreptitiously beneath Upthrusting: pavements, as with teeth, Griped huge weed widening crack and split In squares and circles stone-work erst. Oh, Nature- good! Oh, Art- no whit Less worthy! Both in one- accurst!