 | Poems: Second Series |  |
35
WHENCE AND WHITHER.
O Father to what end
Do all these moments tend—
These drops of time that come and glide away?
To what far-distant goal
Do these wide waters roll,
Whose ripples break the sunshine in its play?
What ocean's infinite embrace
Shall be to each vexed eddy a last resting place?
Do all these moments tend—
These drops of time that come and glide away?
To what far-distant goal
Do these wide waters roll,
Whose ripples break the sunshine in its play?
What ocean's infinite embrace
Shall be to each vexed eddy a last resting place?
Or is it all in vain
That dew and mist and rain
Shed tears of blessing on the earth below?
And is each strong desire
Born only to expire—
A mountain brook lost in the river's flow,
That wanders down without an aim,
Content to reach at last the nothing whence it came?
That dew and mist and rain
Shed tears of blessing on the earth below?
And is each strong desire
Born only to expire—
A mountain brook lost in the river's flow,
That wanders down without an aim,
Content to reach at last the nothing whence it came?
Forgive the uttered thought:—
This present world is nought—
This gleaming reach that sweeps from bend to bend:—
The lispings of the stream
Are murmurs in a dream:—
Flashes of ghostly white the brooks descend:—
If without end or aim for aye
The phantom river glides along its weary way.
This present world is nought—
This gleaming reach that sweeps from bend to bend:—
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Are murmurs in a dream:—
Flashes of ghostly white the brooks descend:—
If without end or aim for aye
The phantom river glides along its weary way.
Life is not thus accurst:
The end is last and first,
More true, more certain than each fleeting drop:—
The end controls the course,
Itself the truest source,
Womb of the mists that haunt the mountain top:—
Trace to its birth the moorland burn—
'Twas Ocean gave the clouds that feed its fountain urn.
The end is last and first,
More true, more certain than each fleeting drop:—
The end controls the course,
Itself the truest source,
Womb of the mists that haunt the mountain top:—
Trace to its birth the moorland burn—
'Twas Ocean gave the clouds that feed its fountain urn.
Once—I remember well—
What time the last leaves fell,
Fell eddying down on the broad river's breast—
Above, the Heaven's height
Was leaden-hued and white—
Frosty and red the sunset in the west—
The earth lay cold and dead below,
Wrapped in a winding sheet of thin November snow.—
What time the last leaves fell,
Fell eddying down on the broad river's breast—
Above, the Heaven's height
Was leaden-hued and white—
Frosty and red the sunset in the west—
The earth lay cold and dead below,
Wrapped in a winding sheet of thin November snow.—
Was it the wintry blast
That whispered as it passed
“The flowers of spring—the leaves of summer die:
Bleak northern winds assail
Thy warm and sheltered vale:
Rise up: forget the stream that ripples by:
Far, far away they speak to thee—
The mountain solitudes, the wastes of rolling sea.”
That whispered as it passed
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Bleak northern winds assail
Thy warm and sheltered vale:
Rise up: forget the stream that ripples by:
Far, far away they speak to thee—
The mountain solitudes, the wastes of rolling sea.”
“O stern imperious fate”
I answered—“let me wait
A few bright seasons in these happy fields:
I fear the frozen steep,
I tremble at the deep—
Sweet, sweet the flowers the river meadow yields:—
Spare me awhile to see once more
The brushwood lost to view—the elm roof darkened o'er.”
I answered—“let me wait
A few bright seasons in these happy fields:
I fear the frozen steep,
I tremble at the deep—
Sweet, sweet the flowers the river meadow yields:—
Spare me awhile to see once more
The brushwood lost to view—the elm roof darkened o'er.”
Such was my prayer—but thou
“Rise up, if ever, now
While yet the boughs are bare, the birds are dumb:
Thy true life is not here
Where greenest leaves grow sere—
Rise—if thou tarry till the spring-time come,
The clinging flowers will bid thee stay,
The songs of happy birds detain thee on thy way.”
“Rise up, if ever, now
While yet the boughs are bare, the birds are dumb:
Thy true life is not here
Where greenest leaves grow sere—
Rise—if thou tarry till the spring-time come,
The clinging flowers will bid thee stay,
The songs of happy birds detain thee on thy way.”
38
And did I rise and go?
I know not—who may know
The deep mysterious secrets of his soul?
We dream not what we are—
What life we live afar—
Beyond our thought, beyond the clouds that roll:—
We search our hearts and grope and guess,
And catch a glimpse—a flash—that blinds with burning stress.
I know not—who may know
The deep mysterious secrets of his soul?
We dream not what we are—
What life we live afar—
Beyond our thought, beyond the clouds that roll:—
We search our hearts and grope and guess,
And catch a glimpse—a flash—that blinds with burning stress.
Yet waking or in dreams
My heart has traced the streams
That feed the river to their icy source,
Has somewhere stood alone,
And heard the ocean moan,
And seen the river end its weary course:—
And sometimes through its valley sweep
The mountain's icy blast—the breezes from the deep.
My heart has traced the streams
That feed the river to their icy source,
Has somewhere stood alone,
And heard the ocean moan,
And seen the river end its weary course:—
And sometimes through its valley sweep
The mountain's icy blast—the breezes from the deep.
Its wave awakes to light,
Beyond the utmost sight,
In mountain wastes of pure eternal snow,
That buttress wintry peaks,
Whose stillness only speaks
Now and again to us who dwell below,
When through the slumber of our souls
The midnight avalanche with voice of thunder rolls.
Beyond the utmost sight,
In mountain wastes of pure eternal snow,
That buttress wintry peaks,
Whose stillness only speaks
Now and again to us who dwell below,
When through the slumber of our souls
The midnight avalanche with voice of thunder rolls.
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Then for a moment's space,
With pale uplifted face,
We listen and we wonder and are still:
But soon each wonted strain
Of life awakes again—
The runnels babble down the wooded hill,
And breezes rustling through the trees
Hide from our hearts the voice of vaster harmonies.
With pale uplifted face,
We listen and we wonder and are still:
But soon each wonted strain
Of life awakes again—
The runnels babble down the wooded hill,
And breezes rustling through the trees
Hide from our hearts the voice of vaster harmonies.
And widening as it goes
The river flows and flows,
Till wood and steep grow dim on either side:
And waves begin to roll,
And grandly—soul to soul—
It meets the rushing of the ocean tide,
And faints for joy, and falls asleep
On the broad heaving breast of the unmeasured deep.
The river flows and flows,
Till wood and steep grow dim on either side:
And waves begin to roll,
And grandly—soul to soul—
It meets the rushing of the ocean tide,
And faints for joy, and falls asleep
On the broad heaving breast of the unmeasured deep.
But sometimes, fresh and free,
The salt wind from the sea
Breathes through the dingles of our woodland home:
We drink the fragrance in,
And drinking seem to win
A moment's glimpse of headlands white with foam:
But violets tempt our feet apart,
And straight the message fades forgotten from the heart.
The salt wind from the sea
Breathes through the dingles of our woodland home:
We drink the fragrance in,
And drinking seem to win
A moment's glimpse of headlands white with foam:
But violets tempt our feet apart,
And straight the message fades forgotten from the heart.
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“Fool, be content to stray
Here in this Eden with its blissful bowers:
Make good each moment's flight
With its own brief delight:
Gather the sweets of sunshine and of flowers:
Nor lose familiar paths of men
For cold and shadowy lands beyond thy fancy's ken.
Here in sweet interchange
The rolling seasons range:—
If birds are dumb, we prize their songs the more:
Light deepens out of shade,
And summer's green leaves fade
To dawn again more sweetly than before:
These are thine heritage, but there
Is vast monotony or desolate despair.”
The rolling seasons range:—
If birds are dumb, we prize their songs the more:
Light deepens out of shade,
And summer's green leaves fade
To dawn again more sweetly than before:
These are thine heritage, but there
Is vast monotony or desolate despair.”
I know not—but I know
That I must some day go
Alone into the mountains' midnight sleep:
And I must some day stand
Alone upon the strand,
And hear the surging thunder of the deep:
And wood and flower and purling stream
Must fade away from thought like a forgotten dream.
That I must some day go
Alone into the mountains' midnight sleep:
And I must some day stand
Alone upon the strand,
And hear the surging thunder of the deep:
And wood and flower and purling stream
Must fade away from thought like a forgotten dream.
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How shall I bear my part—
How and with what a heart—
In that new world whose threshold is in this?
If I have framed my mind
To what I leave behind,
How shall I quit this portal of my bliss,
And see the soaring pillars bear
The vaulted roof aloft into the twilight air?
How and with what a heart—
In that new world whose threshold is in this?
If I have framed my mind
To what I leave behind,
How shall I quit this portal of my bliss,
And see the soaring pillars bear
The vaulted roof aloft into the twilight air?
If never from below
I watched the cold, cold snow
High in the starlit slumber of the night:—
If never rose for me
Over the rolling sea
The sudden splendour of the dawning light—
If moanings from the ocean foam
Bore me no message from a far mysterious home:—
I watched the cold, cold snow
High in the starlit slumber of the night:—
If never rose for me
Over the rolling sea
The sudden splendour of the dawning light—
If moanings from the ocean foam
Bore me no message from a far mysterious home:—
Shall I not move alone
Through regions not my own,
Forlorn and friendless in an alien land?—
Ah! well, but who shall say?
And that is far away,
And the soft summer twilight is at hand:—
And oh! how sweet the wakening breeze,
Whose kisses cool my brow and stir the sheltering trees.
Through regions not my own,
Forlorn and friendless in an alien land?—
Ah! well, but who shall say?
And that is far away,
And the soft summer twilight is at hand:—
And oh! how sweet the wakening breeze,
Whose kisses cool my brow and stir the sheltering trees.
| Poems: Second Series | |