Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

PROBLEM AND ANSWER by HORTENSE KING FLEXNER

First Line: TO CONJURE LIFE INTO A LONELY WASTE
Last Line: AND SOLVE THE SUBTLE TRICK WITH MORE THAN SLEEP.
Subject(s): CREATION; DEATH; GOD; RELIGION; DEAD, THE; THEOLOGY;
To conjure life into a lonely waste
Of mud or ice, required a force more blind
With lust and strength, than the far-seeing God
We credit in the prayer-book, and yet
To have added death must prove the whirl-wind kind,
The tempest not a moment of black haste,
Creation not a stirring in the clod—
But genius, once the problem had been set,
To bring it to conclusion in one sweep,
And solve the subtle trick with more than sleep.



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