Ask Not One Another

ASK not one another
Concerning the Spirit —
Can the mute inform the deaf?
Would you, O Incautious,
Ask again for a miracle according to your senses ?
O Backward and Base,
Do your lips yet long for the dust ’neath the feet of a golden calf?

Would you ask the sun to pour out differently, or less, or more?
Behold you not that the sun pours out, not all it can pour,
But all that you can use?
Behold you not the sun gathering together the clouds to shield you only,
While upon your neighbor falls his fullness?
Behold you not that in your turn comes your need,
And the clouds are folded up like a plumèd feather fan?

Ask no man —
O Unabashed and Forward,
Would you fishwive in a cathedral?

Go ask the sun!
Go ask your eyes how they open to the light of the morning;
Go ask the comb whence comes the honey;
Go ask the lily cup whence comes the dew.

And when you know,
All shall know you know,
For these are things not said in words.

So ask not one another;
Tax not rude speech with messages beyond its speaking;
But bide without clamor until your time to know is come.
For, — believe me, for I love you, —
The bell that claps in the belfry of the mouth calls no one to vespers,
And the gates of the flesh open not upon the Spirit.