Then a war of shame and anger
  Did the realm of his soul divide;
“’Tis false, ’tis a lying vision,”
  In the face of his God he cried. 
“Thou thinkest to daunt me with shadows;
  Not such as Thou feign’st is my doom: 
From glory to rise unto glory
  Is mine, who have risen from gloom. 
I doubt if Thou knew’st at my making
  How near to thy throne I should climb,
O’er the mountainous slopes of the ages
  And the conquered peaks of time. 
Nor shall I look backward nor rest me
  Till the uttermost heights I have trod,
And am equalled with Thee or above Thee,
  The mate or the master of God.”

Ev’n thus Man turned from the Maker,
  With thundered defiance wild,
And God with a terrible silence
  Reproved the speech of His child. 
And man returned to his labours,
  And stiffened the neck of his will;
And the aeons still went rolling,
  And his power was crescent still. 
But yet there remained to conquer
  One foe, and the greatest—­although
Despoiled of his ancient terrors,
  At heart, as of old, a foe—­
Unmaker of all, and renewer,
  Who winnows the world with his wing,
The Lord of Death, the undying,
  Ev’n Asrael the King.

And lo, Man mustered his forces
  The war of wars to wage,
And with storm and thunder of onset
  Did the foe of foes engage,
And the Lord of Death, the undying,
  Was beset and harried sore,
In his immemorial fastness
  At night’s aboriginal core. 
And during years a thousand
  Man leaguered his enemy’s hold,
While nature was one deep tremor,
  And the heart of the world waxed cold,
Till the phantom battlements wavered,
  And the ghostly fortress fell,
And Man with shadowy fetters
  Bound fast great Asrael.

So, to each star in the heavens,
  The exultant word was blown,
The annunciation tremendous,
  Death is overthrown!
And Space in her ultimate borders
  Prolonging the jubilant tone,
With hollow ingeminations,
  Sighed, Death is overthrown!
And God in His house of silence,
  Where He dwelleth aloof, alone,
Paused in His tasks to hearken: 
  Death is overthrown!

Then a solemn and high thanksgiving
  By Man unto Man was sung,
In his temples of self-adoration,
  With his own multitudinous tongue;
And he said to his Soul:  “Rejoice thou
  For thy last great foe lies bound,
Ev’n Asrael the Unmaker,
  Unmade, disarmed, discrowned.”

And behold, his Soul rejoiced not,
  The breath of whose being was strife,
For life with nothing to vanquish
  Seemed but the shadow of life. 
No goal invited and promised
  And divinely provocative shone;
And Fear having fled, her sister,
  Blest Hope, in her train was gone;
And the coping and crown of achievement
  Was hell than defeat more dire—­