What matters down here in the darkness?

’Tis only the rat that squeals,

Crushed down under the iron hoof.

’Tis only the fool that feels.

’Tis only the child that weeps and sorrows

For the death of a love or a rose;

While grim in its grinding, soulless mask,

Iron, the iron world goes.

God is an artist, mind is the all,

Only the art survives.

Just for a curve, a tint, a fancy,

Millions on millions of lives!

If this be your creed, O late-world poet,

Pass, with your puerile pose;

For I am the fool, the child that suffers,

That weeps and sleeps with the rose.