Classic Poem

"O little Cloud,' the virgin said, "I charge thee tell to me'
Why thou complainest not, when in one hour thou fad'st away:
Then we shall seek thee, but not find. Ah! Thel is like to thee--
I pass away; yet I complain, and no one hears my voice.'

". . . O maid, I tell thee, when I pass away,
It is to tenfold life, to love, to peace, and raptures holy.
Unseen descending, weigh my light wings upon balmy flowers,
And court the fair-eyed dew to take me to her shining tent:
The weeping virgin, trembling, kneels before the risen sun,
Till we arise, linked in a golden band, and never part,
But walk united, bearing food to all our tender flowers.'

"Dost thou, O little Cloud? I fear that I am not like thee,
For I walk through the vales of Har, and smell the sweetest flowers,
But I feed not the little flowers. I hear the warbling birds,
But I feed not the warbling birds: they fly and seek their food.
But Thel delights in these no more, because I fade away,
And all shall say: "Without a use this shining woman lived;
Or did she only live to be at death the food of worms?" '

The Cloud reclined upon his airy throne, and answered thus:
"Then if thou art the food of worms, O virgin of the skies,
How great thy use, how great thy blessing! Everything that lives
Lives not alone, nor for itself . . .'