Classic Poem

Back to the womb I creep, back to the womb!
Let snows and stagnant seas my province blight,
Deep down in matrix grots shall I consume
My mother's flesh, my spirit and the night.
I shall beat about her heart a few brief years,--
I, who once rolled fiery gold through all her veins,
And soared from mountain-throats o'er hemispheres,
And throbbed in huts and palaces and fanes.
What power in me abode! what loveliness!
The three vast elements proclaimed me king,
Straight from the Sun I sank with gifts to bless
The world with living tongue and burning wing.
I came, and Man sat caverned with the brute;
I nursed him and he rose into a god;
I leave him and he withers with the fruit
Of ages on the ground his splendour trod.
Farewell, you airs and skies from whence I fell,
Fond Earth, farewell, and all thy beauty past--
And thou, old pulseless Ocean foe, farewell!--
All dead! I too shall die, though I be last.