Though my soul may set in darkness, it will rise in perfect light

Is it so, O Christ in heaven, that the highest suffer most? That the strongest wander farthest, and more hopelessly are lost? That the mark of rank in nature is capacity for pain, And the anguish of the singer makes the sweetness of the …

What, for us, are all distractions of men's fellowship and smiles? What, for us, the goddess Pleasure, with her meretricious wiles?

Reach me down my Tycho Brahé, — I would know him when we meet, When I share my later science, sitting humbly at his feet.

Song like a rose should be; Each rhyme a petal sweet; For fragrance, melody, That when her lips repeat The words, her heart may know What secret makes them so:—

And also there’s a little star So white a virgin’s it must be:— Perhaps the lamp my love in heaven Hangs out to light the way for me.

O fairest of the feather’d train! For whom I sing, for whom I burn, Attend with pity to my strain, And grant my love a kind return.