Louis Blanc - Three Sonnets To His Memory

I.     The stainless soul that smiled through glorious eyes;     The bright grave brow whereon dark fortunes blast     Might blow, but might not bend it, nor oercast,     Save for one fierce fleet hour of shame, the skies     Thrilled with warm dreams of worthier days to rise     And end the whole worlds winter; here at last,     If death be death, have passed into the past;     If death be life, live, though their semblance dies.     Hope and high faith inviolate of distrust     Shone strong as life inviolate of the grave     Through each bright word and lineament serene.     Most loving righteousness and love most just     Crowned, as day crowns the dawn-enkindled wave,     With visible aureole thine unfaltering mien. II.     Strong time and fire-swift change, with lightnings clad     And shod with thunders of reverberate years,     Have filled with light and sound of hopes and fears     The space of many a season, since I had     Grace of good hap to make my spirit glad,     Once communing with thine: and memory hears     The bright voice yet that then rejoiced mine ears,     Sees yet the light of eyes that spake, and bade     Fear not, but hope, though then times heart were weak     And heaven by hell shade-stricken, and the range     Of high-born hope made questionable and strange     As twilight trembling till the sunlight speak.     Thou sawest the sunrise and the storm in one     Break: seest thou now the storm-compelling sun? III.     Surely thou seest, O spirit of light and fire,     Surely thou canst not choose, O soul, but see     The days whose dayspring was beheld of thee     Ere eyes less pure might have their hopes desire,     Beholding life in heaven again respire     Where men saw nought that was or was to be,     Save only death imperial. Thou and he     Who has the heart of all mens hearts for lyre,     Ye twain, being great of spirit as time is great,     And sure of sight as truths own heavenward eye,     Beheld the forms of forces passing by     And certitude of equal-balanced fate,     Whose breath forefelt makes darkness palpitate,     And knew that light should live and darkness die.