Book II Canto II S4 This wonder-world with all its radiant boon.mp3

MP3 File

Stanza 4, Page 106
This wonder-world with all its radiant boon
Of vision and inviolate happiness,
Only for expression cares and perfect form;
Fair on its peaks, it has dangerous nether planes;
Its light draws towards the verge of Nature's lapse;
It lends beauty to the terror of the gulfs
And fascinating eyes to perilous Gods,
Invests with grace the demon and the snake.
Its trance imposes earth's inconscience,
Immortal it weaves for us death's sombre robe
And authorises our mortality.

Book II Canto II S3 In rooms of the young divinity of power.mp3

MP3 File

Stanza 3, Page 104
In rooms of the young divinity of power
And early play of the eternal Child
The embodiments of his outwinging thoughts
Laved in a bright everlasting wonder's tints
And lulled by whispers of that lucid air
Take dream-hued rest like birds on timeless trees
Before they dive to float on earth-time's sea.
All that here seems has lovelier semblance there.

Book II Canto II S8 Admired for the bright finality of its lines.mp3

MP3 File

Stanza 8, Page 114
Admired for the bright finality of its lines
A blue horizon limited the soul;
Thought moved in luminous facilities,
The outer ideal's shallows its swim-range:

Book II Canto II S7 In us too the intuitive Fire can burn.mp3

MP3 File

Stanza 7, Page 112-113
In us too the intuitive Fire can burn;
An agent Light, it is coiled in our folded hearts,
On the celestial levels is its home:
Descending, it can bring those heavens here.
But rarely burns the flame nor burns for long;
The joy it calls from those diviner heights
Brings brief magnificent reminiscences
 And high splendid glimpses of interpreting thought,
But not the utter vision and delight.

Book II Canto II S9 Life in its boundaries lingered satisfied.mp3

MP3 File

Stanza 9, Page 114
Life in its boundaries lingered satisfied
With the small happiness of the body's acts.
Assigned as Force to a bound corner-Mind,
Attached to the safe paucity of her room,
She did her little works and played and slept
And thought not of a greater work undone.