The Power And The Glory

Can you not see
Here motion is intricate
within a mesh of qualified advances
interlinked and mutual; involved
in patterned arcs of love and hate
Can you not see
here instant-flashing words reflect
a myriad rays whose slightest gleams evoke a hundred flares.
Till you sense the indifferent desire
of the silent snow for your fairness
the richness of a cursing voice
in heavy solitudes.
Spares your spirit for a stronger test.
Could you but feel
the moment of the body's fear
(freed, meets sun, wind, rain, nor fails
ever, stung and alive)
only the instant of the body's fear,
held back from granite slope by rotted branch
or loosened rock, will tender proof
of that impartial mood beneath whose smart
your spirit's pride is numb: in this moment only
the flares gutter to darkness, and thought quivers to life—
rising triumphant, breaks new ground.