Part and Counterpart

1895

The infant soul made up of images
Is like a lake, itself almost unseen,
But holding pictured in its "pure serene"
The sky above and the surrounding trees,
Till o'er the surface creeps a rising breeze
And slowly ruffles into silver sheen
Those depths of azure fringed with branching green,
A flame that follows on a form that flees.

As intermingled with the flow of being
It loses sight in gaining sympathy,
So action quenches all our primal seeing.
We cannot be both part and counterpart
Of outward things, and that passivity
A poet praised is half the poet's art.

— Alfred W. Benn in Academy.