OUR house of Life that hath been built so long,
That is so fitly stored, whose plan denies
That it shall further wax in worth or size,
Yet stands on its foundations, fair and strong.
But what of these swift motions that still throng
Its courts, these longings, these disquietudes,
As of a restless presence that still broods,
Or prisoner making protest against wrong?

We stand a-gaze before each door of sense;
Or are we eyeless, or is nought to see?
We turn within, and straight upon the tense
Rack of blind hunger for some thing to be,
Are stretched again: this consciousness of night,
Is't of a spirit travailing with sight?