The Collected Poems of Rupert Brooke

In Examination

   Lo! from quiet skies
   In through the window my Lord the Sun!
   And my eyes
   Were dazzled and drunk with the misty gold,
   The golden glory that drowned and crowned me
   Eddied and swayed through the room . . .
                                             Around me,
   To left and to right,
   Hunched figures and old,
   Dull blear-eyed scribbling fools, grew fair,
   Ringed round and haloed with holy light.
   Flame lit on their hair,
   And their burning eyes grew young and wise,
   Each as a God, or King of kings,
   White-robed and bright
   (Still scribbling all);
   And a full tumultuous murmur of wings
   Grew through the hall;
   And I knew the white undying Fire,
   And, through open portals,
   Gyre on gyre,
   Archangels and angels, adoring, bowing,
   And a Face unshaded . . .
   Till the light faded;
   And they were but fools again, fools unknowing,
   Still scribbling, blear-eyed and stolid immortals.