re the eyes of the sun.

With the storm that is called "spirit" did I blow over thy surging
sea; all clouds did I blow away from it; I strangled even the strangler
called "sin."

O my soul, I gave thee the right to say Nay like the storm, and to say
Yea as the open heaven saith Yea: calm as the light remainest thou, and
now walkest through denying storms.

O my soul, I restored to thee liberty over the created and the
uncreated; and who knoweth, as thou knowest, the voluptuousness of the
future?

O my soul, I taught thee the contempt which doth not come like
worm-eating, the great, the loving contempt, which loveth most where it
contemneth most.

O my soul, I taught thee so to persuade that thou persuadest even the
grounds themselves to thee: like the sun, which persuadeth even the sea
to its height.

O my soul, I have taken from thee all obeying and knee-bending and
homage-paying; I have myself given thee the names, "Change of need" and
"Fate."

O my soul, I have given thee new names and gay-coloured playthings,
I have called thee "Fate" and "the Circuit of circuits" and "the
Navel-string of time" and "the Azure bell."

O my soul, to thy domain gave I all wisdom to drink, all new wines, and
also all immemorially old strong wines of wisdom.

O my soul, every sun shed I upon thee, and every night and every silence
and every longing:--then grewest thou up for me as a vine.

O my soul, exuberant and heavy dost thou now stand forth, a vine with
swelling udders and full clusters of brown golden grapes:--

--Filled and weighted by thy happiness, waiting from superabundance, and
yet ashamed of thy waiting.

O my soul, there is nowhere a soul which could be more loving and more
comprehensive and more extensive! Where could future and past be closer
together than with thee?

O my soul, I have given thee everything, and all my hands have become
empty by thee:--and now! Now sayest thou to me, smiling and full of
melancholy: "Which of us oweth thanks?--

--Doth the giver not owe thanks because the receiver received? Is
bestowing not a necessity? Is receiving not--pitying?"--

O my soul, I understand the smiling of thy melancholy: thine
over-abundance itself now stretcheth out longing hands!

Thy fulness looketh forth over raging seas, and seeketh and waiteth: the
longing of over-fulness looketh forth from the smiling heaven of thine
eyes!

And verily, O my soul! Who could see thy smiling and not melt
into te