In all they brood,
The inexorable!
Out of primeval shadow have they stood
In judgment over all.
They brook not, these,
Earth's gainsay, nor the sea's,
Arbiters of our more, our less,
Our nothingness.

Apart, a few,
They merge, divide,
Or, gathering in multitudes anew
Spread forth in armies.
Their ancient law
Still rules the world,
Bids science halt or dare,
Bids art beware.

Fact's own they are,
Yet, counselling dream,
Bright wings for thought's invasion of a star,
Fins for the diver's gleam,
Unerring eyes
To pierce the hidden skies,
Unerring feet to enter
The rock's dark center.

With lamps upheld,
Austere and strong
They wait behind the Muses. Sun-impelled
Apollo never outruns
Their fleet throng.
They guard a million suns! —
Mindful to mold a sapling's grace,
A lily's face.

They forge the curse
Of ways unlit.
They are the heartbreak of the universe.
They are the joy of it.
Unseeing we pass
Their pattern in the grass.
But we are theirs, and they defy