“Moses as Lamp-Bearer”

A CURIOUS fancy seized on Moses’ soul,

To know if God, the Lord, slept like a man:

So Allah sent an angel from on high,

Who to the Holy Prophet this wise spake—

“Take, Moses, in thy hands two burning lamps,

Then take thy stand and hold thyself upright,

With both arms stretched full length, and keep them so;

And watch then the whole night through and through.”

Then Moses took the lamps and placed himself

And held them fast on high a long, long time.

But at the last such weariness came on him,

That the lamps fell to earth from out his hands.

“Thus,” cried the angel, “thus, O simple man,

Thus would the sun and moon and starry host,

Thus would the joined fabric of the world

In waste and ruin fall, did Allah sleep!”