Before the Æons Came

Before the beginning of years There came to the making of man Time, with a gift of tears Grief, with a glass that ran Pleasure, with pain for leaven Summer, with flowers that fell Remembrance fallen from heaven And madness risen from hell Strength without hands to smite Love that endures for a breath Night the shadow of light And life the shadow of death And the high gods took in hand Fire and the falling of tears And a measure of sliding sand From under the feet of the years And froth and drift of the sea And dust of the laboring earth And bodies of things to be In the houses of death and of birth And wrought with weeping and laughter And fashioned with loathing and love With life before and after And death beneath and above