The kingdom of God is within youO world invisible, we view thee,
O world intangible, we touch thee,
O world unknowable, we know thee,
Inapprehensible, we clutch thee!
Does the fish soar to find the ocean,
The eagle plunge to find the air— That we ask of the stars in motion If they have rumor of thee there?
Not where the wheeling systems darken,
And our benumbed conceiving soars!— The drift of pinions, would we hearken,
Beats at our own clay-shuttered doors.
The angels keep their ancient places— Turn but a stone and start a wing! 'Tis ye, 'tis your estrangèd faces,
That miss the many-splendored thing.
But (when so sad thou canst not sadder) Cry—and upon thy so sore loss Shall shine the traffic of Jacob's ladder Pitched betwixt Heaven and Charing Cross.
Yea, in the night, my Soul, my daughter,
Cry—clinging to Heaven by the hems;
And lo,
Christ walking on the water,
Not of Genesareth, but Thames!
