A golden age, an Eden
before the growth of wrong
has haunted human fancy
indissolubly long
and cast its mirror-image
against the clouds ahead:
a heaven to be happy
again when wrong is dead.
Today we feel behind us
the struggle of the ape.
The future’s cloud is gathered
into a monstrous shape.
Yet here and now about me
between two thoughts I see
a sleeping beauty’s kingdom
that was and is to be.