Collected Poems: With Autobiographical and Critical Fragments By Frederic W. H. Myers: Edited by his Wife Eveleen Myers |
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A CHILD OF THE AGE |
 | Collected Poems: With Autobiographical and Critical Fragments |  |
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A CHILD OF THE AGE
I
Oh for a voice that in a single songCould quiver with the hopes and moan the fears
And speak the speechless secret of the years,
And rise, and sink, and at the last be strong!
O for a trumpet call to stir the throng
Of doubtful fighting-men, whose eyes and ears
Watch till a banner in the east appears
And the skies ring that have been still so long!
O age of mine, if one could tune for thee
A marching music out of this thy woe!
If one could climb upon a hill and see
Thy gates of promise on the plain below,
And gaze a minute on the bliss to be
And knowing it be satisfied to know!
II
I thought to stand alone upon a heightAbove the waters where my kinsmen lie;
363
I dreamed I saw a dawning in the sky:
I said, “For you, for you, with keener sight,
I watch till on the waves the dawn be nigh”:
I said, “While these men slumber, what delight
That we two should be waking, God and I!”
Ah me! the deathful waters climb and creep,
Far off the melancholy deep to deep
Murmurs a tidal infinite reply:
“Oh fool, oh foolish prodigal of sleep,
Remains, remains but with the waves to weep,
Or in the darkness with the dead to die.”
| Collected Poems: With Autobiographical and Critical Fragments | |