The Haunts of the Raven

Every day I build domes,
I raise them above the crests of the clouds,
And wipe them with dew and mist,
And scatter within them wondrous pearls.

Their ornaments are of the wing of sunset,
And their breaths,
Gathered from Suha, the faintest star,
Are baskets of perfume.

And God has shadows there
To which imagination goes on pilgrimage,
To sip the essence of beauty
And sound the depths of the impossible.

And the nightingale has a lover's call —
A gentle beloved who, though near, went far,
Who appeared a stranger and turned away a stranger,
And neither greeted nor bade farewell,
Nor said: tomorrow I am resolved to come.

Domes, domes,
Looking down in pride upon the Lote Tree of the Utmost Boundary;
Toward them desires
Die of thirst, or grow weary of the mirage,

And in their shade sleeps all that is longed for.

And every day I see the tempest
Ranging, roaring, thundering;
It sows ruin,
It pulls down the domes and blots out the palaces
And turns them into a handful of graves
Where a raven glorifies annihilation,

And owls screech and wolves howl.

O soil made of the wreckage of hopes
And of memories of fragrance and light,
I have asked you to bring forth the lily,
For my heart and my beloved's heart are here,
Both laid low among the remains of the domes —
My two companions in passion, my two companions in torment.