I
Toiling through ruined temple-halls, where Time
Had dwelt with Havoc, eager searchers found,
With shattered idols that bestrewed the ground,
An image strange, of lineaments sublime.
No god was he of rapine or of crime;
With ample brows his brooding face was crowned;
But lips and eyes were curiously bound
With golden circlets hoar with ageless grime.

One who was skilled in runes the gravings read,
And learned the wondrous image was the god
Of endless Silence. The searchers mutely bowed,
And mourned that faith so lofty should be dead;
And I their prone idolatry applaud
When strife and tumult in my paths are loud.

II
Beyond the search of sun or wandering star,
In that deep cincture of eternal night
That shrouds and stays this orbed flare of light
Where many a god hath wheeled his griding car,
Silence is brooding, patient and afar,
Secure and steadfast in his primal right,
Reconquering slowly, with resistless might,
Dominions lost in immemorial war.
The thronged suns are paling to their doom,
The constellations waver, and a breath
Shall blur them all into eternity;
Then Ancient Silence in oblivious gloom
Shall reign—where holds this dream of Time and
Death
Like some brief bubble in a shoreless sea.