The Dying Pantheist to the Priest
Reading edition
Henry A. Beers, the author of this dynamic poem from which we quote only a part, is a professor of literature at Yale—a man supposedly conventional and soft spoken!
Take your ivory Christ away: No dying god shall have my knee, While live gods breathe in this wild wind And shout from yonder dashing sea. O no, the old gods are not dead: I think that they will never die; But I, who lie upon this bed In mortal anguish—what am I? A wave that rises with a breath Above the infinite watery plain, To foam and sparkle in the sun A moment ere it sink again. The eternal undulation runs: A man, I die; perchance to be, Next life, a white-throat on the wind, A daffodil on Tempe’s lea. They lied who said that Pan was dead: Life was, life is, and life shall be. So take away your crucifix— The ever-living gods for me! —The Yale Review.