XX

Exhales itself in flowers of gentle breath;

      Like incarnations of the stars, when splendour

      Is changed to fragrance, they illumine death

      And mock the merry worm that wakes beneath;

      Nought we know, dies. Shall that alone which knows

      Be as a sword consumed before the sheath

      By sightless lightning?-the intense atom glows

A moment, then is quenched in a most cold repose.