Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, SO IS HE MADE, by SARAH LITSEY


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

SO IS HE MADE, by                    
First Line: Beneath the hill, athwart the stream
Last Line: Conquers the deathless thing and dies.
Subject(s): Reason; Intellect; Rationalism; Brain; Mind; Intellectuals


Beneath the hill, athwart the stream,
The mind of man pursues its dream,

Burrowing, building to erase
Nature from earth's eternal face,

To seal her mouth and close her eyes
With what he may himself devise.

The temporal shadow on his heart
His stubborn will must thrust apart

The everlasting land and seed
The waiting furrow with his need.

With hands no larger than a leaf
He brings a forest down to grief;

Troubles the air with metal wings
And prowls between the roots of things.

Clearly he sees the strength of stone
In mountains yet he'll match his bone

Against it and the mountains bend
Their terrible backs to shape his end.

* * *

Whatever he may hew or hack
He knows that time will take it back;

That his swift mind may not outrun
Earth's patient cycle round the sun.

And yet so urgent is he made,
So transient and so unafraid,

Who now before our mortal eyes
Conquers the deathless thing and dies.





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