CV Hymn to Light
First-born of Chaos, who so fair didst come
From the old Negro’s darksome womb!
Which, when it saw the lovely child,
The melancholy mass put on kind looks and smiled:
Thou tide of glory which no rest dost know, 5
But ever ebb and ever flow!
Thou golden shower of a true Jove!
Who does in thee descend, and heaven to earth make love!
Say, from what golden quivers of the sky
Do all thy wingèd arrows fly? 10
Swiftness and power by birth are thine;
From thy great sire they came, thy sire, the Word Divine.
’Tis, I believe, this archery to show,
That so much cost in colours thou
And skill in painting dost bestow 15
Upon thy ancient arms, the gaudy heavenly bow.
Swift as light thoughts their empty carriere run,
Thy race is finished when begun;
Let a post-angel start with thee,
And thou the goal of earth shalt reach as soon as he. 20
Thou in the moon’s bright chariot proud and gay
Dost thy bright wood of stars survey;
And all the year dost with thee bring
Of thousand flowery lights thine own nocturnal spring.
Thou, Scythian-like, dost round thy lands, above 25
The sun’s gilt tent, for ever move;
And still as thou in pomp dost go,
The shining pageants of the world attend thy show.
Nor amidst all these triumphs dost thou scorn
The humble glowworms to adorn, 30
And with those living spangles gild
(O greatness without pride!) the bushes of the field.
Night and her ugly subjects dost thou fright,
And sleep, the lazy owl of night;
Ashamed and fearful to appear, 35
They screen their horrid shapes with the black hemisphere.
With them there hastes, and wildly takes the alarm,
Of painted dreams a busy swarm;
At the first opening of thine eye
The various clusters break, the antic atoms fly. 40
When, Goddess, thou lift’st up thy wakened head
Out of the Morning’s purple bed,
Thy choir of birds about thee play,
And all thy joyful world salutes the rising day.
All the world’s bravery that delights our eyes, 45
Is but thy several liveries;
Thou the rich dye on them bestowest,
Thy nimble pencil paints this landscape as thou goest.
A crimson garment in the rose thou wear’st;
A crown of studded gold thou bear’st; 50
The virgin lilies, in their white,
Are clad but with the lawn of almost naked light.
The violet, spring’s little infant, stands
Girt in thy purple swaddling-bands;
On the fair tulip thou dost dote, 55
Thou cloth’st it in a gay and parti-coloured coat.
With flame condensed thou dost thy jewels fix,
And solid colours in it mix:
Flora herself envies to see
Flowers fairer than her own, and durable as she. 60
Through the soft ways of heaven and air and sea,
Which open all their pores to thee,
Like a clear river thou dost glide,
And with thy living stream through the close channels slide.
But where firm bodies thy free course oppose, 65
Gently thy source the land o’erflows;
Takes there possession, and does make,
Of colours’ mingled light, a thick and standing lake:
But the vast ocean of unbounded day
In the empyrean heaven does stay; 70
Thy rivers, lakes, and springs below
From thence took first their rise, thither at last must flow.
Abraham Cowley.