Page:Poems and Baudelaire Flowers.djvu/35

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TO THE CONTINENTAL SOCIALISTS
31

Yea, faith was in the mire
And hope had shrunk and sickened
Till you within us quickened
The Dream and the Desire;
The whisper of your name in us
Blew as a wind of shame in us
Until the dwindled flame in us
Burst in a mighty fire.

And by its blaze we knew
The road ’twas ours to follow,
And over hill and hollow
We set us to pursue
That road with toil and fasting,
Our thoughts for comfort casting
Out to the everlasting,
Illimitable blue.

Still as we go we win us
New comrades by the way
To share by night and day
What doom the Fates may spin us;
Each one the old path spurneth
And never one returneth,
And brighter, brighter, burneth
The fervour that is in us.

O glow of things sublime!
O glory of the vision!
May anger or derision
Weigh on our souls, who climb?