I wrote the first eight lines, and fell asleep,

Lulled into slumber by my own dull words;

I dreamed a dream of heaven blue and deep,

The stars a drifting wedge of silver birds.

Above me, and above the valley floor,

How dimly stood the mountains in the dark.

Never was man alive so small before,

So lost on earth, so tiny a moving spark.

But my two heels upon the ground were set,

And I was strong of arm and deep of lung.

Heaven and earth and life and I were met,

And should not pass until my song was sung.

Under the dream of that stupendous night,

With furious brain, and heart absurdly stout,

I dared to cry my difference to the height,

My way, my love, and what I thought about.

At first my words were sparks that blotted out.

Then miles above a storm of music grew,

And the sky changed, light bloomed, and I heard shout

The echoing arches where the sun comes through.

White daylight broke around the airy shores:

My mind pressed hard at every boundary,

Opening taller and more distant doors-

And I had always known how this would be.