Poems By William Walsham How ... New and Enlarged Edition |
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A Starlit Night by the Seashore.
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191
A Starlit Night by the Seashore.
SUGGESTED BY MATTHEW ARNOLD'S “SELF-DEPENDENCE.”
O great Stars, aflame with awful beauty!
O great Sea, with glittering heaving breast!
Stars, that march all calm in lines of duty;
Sea, that swayest to stern law's behest;—
O great Sea, with glittering heaving breast!
Stars, that march all calm in lines of duty;
Sea, that swayest to stern law's behest;—
Mighty in your unimpassioned splendour,
Ye are filling all my puny soul
With the longing this vexed self to render
Wholly to calm Duty's sure control.
Ye are filling all my puny soul
With the longing this vexed self to render
Wholly to calm Duty's sure control.
It were restful so to let the ruling
Of the mightier law sway all the life,
Eager will and passionate spirit schooling,
Till unfelt the pains of lesser strife.
Of the mightier law sway all the life,
Eager will and passionate spirit schooling,
Till unfelt the pains of lesser strife.
Yet, O Stars, your quivering shafts unheeding
On these tangled human sorrows smite;
Merciless Stars! that on hearts crushed and bleeding
Pour the sharp stings of your bleak cold light.
On these tangled human sorrows smite;
Merciless Stars! that on hearts crushed and bleeding
Pour the sharp stings of your bleak cold light.
192
Yet, O Sea, that glittering breast is heaving,
All unconscious of the life it rears,
Shouting in the mirth of its bereaving,
Laughing o'er a thousand widows' tears.
All unconscious of the life it rears,
Shouting in the mirth of its bereaving,
Laughing o'er a thousand widows' tears.
No! I ask not for a life high lifted
O'er the changeful passions of mankind,
Undistracted, self-contained, and gifted
With a force to feebler issues blind.
O'er the changeful passions of mankind,
Undistracted, self-contained, and gifted
With a force to feebler issues blind.
Rather fill my soul to overflowing
With the tide of this world's grief and wrong:
Let me suffer; though it be in knowing,
Suffering thus, I am not wholly strong.
With the tide of this world's grief and wrong:
Let me suffer; though it be in knowing,
Suffering thus, I am not wholly strong.
Let what grandeur crown the life of others,
Let what light on lone endurance shine;
I will set myself beside my brothers,
And their toils and troubles shall be mine.
Let what light on lone endurance shine;
I will set myself beside my brothers,
And their toils and troubles shall be mine.
(1885.)
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