Alfred Lord Tennyson

It little profits that an idle king ,
By this still hearth, among these barren crags,
Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race,
That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me
I cannot rest from travel: I will drink
Life to the lees: all times I have enjoy'd
Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with those
That loved me, and alone; on shore, and when
Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades
Vext the dim sea: I am become a name;
For always roaming with a hungry heart
Much have I seen and known; cities of men
And manners, climates, councils, governments,
Myself not least, but honor'd of them all;
And drunk delight of battle with my peers,
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.
I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'
Gleams that untravell'd world, whose margin fades
For ever and forever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end
To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use!
As tho' to breathe were life. Life piled on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains: but every hour is saved end.
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,
And this gray spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.
This is my son, mine own Telemachus,
To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle -
Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil
This labour by slow prudence to make mild
A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees
Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centered in the sphere
Of common duties, decent not to fail
In offices of tenderness, and pay
Meet adoration to my household gods,
When I am gone. He works his work
I mine.
There lies the port: the vessel puffs her sail:
There gloom the dark broad seas. My mariners,
Souls that have toil'd and wrought,
and thought with me -
That ever with a frolic welcome took
The thunder and the sun shine, and opposed
Free hearts, free foreheads - you and I are old;
Old age hath yet his honor and his toil;
Death closes all: but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:
The long day wanes: the slow moon climbes: the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,
'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven; that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive , to seek, to find, and not to yield.

Ulysses

[pp. 77-78]

- - - - -
The Palace of Art

I built my soul a lordly pleasure-
house,
Wherein at ease for aye to dwell.
I said, "O Soul, make merry and ca-
rouse,
Dear soul, for all is well."

. . . . [p. 28]

- - - - -
The Poets Song

The rain had fallen, the Poet arose,
He pass'd by the town and out of the
street;
A light wind blew from the gates of
the sun
And waves of shadow went over the
wheat.

And he sat him down in a lonely place,
And chanted a melody loud and
sweet,
That made the wild-swan pause in her
cloud,
And the lark drop down at his feet.

The swallow stopt as he hunted the
bee,
The snake slipt under a spray,
The wild hawk stood with the down on
his beak,
And stared, with his foot on the prey.

And the nightingale thought , "I have
sung many songs,
But never a one so gay,
For he sings of what the world will be
When the years have died away."

]p. 106]

- - - - -
The Voyage

We left behind the painted buoy
That tosses at the harbor-mouth;
And madly danced our hearts with joy,
As fast we fleeted to the South:
How fresh was every sight and sound
On open main or winding shore!
We knew the merry world was round,
And we might sail for evermore.
Warm broke the breeze against the brow
Dry sang the tackle, sang the sail:
The Lady's -head upon the prow
Caught the shrill salt, and sheer'd the gale.
The broad seas swell'd to meet the keel,
And swept behind: so quick the run,
We felt the good ship shake and reel,
We seem'd to sail into the Sun!
How oft we saw the Sun retire,
And burn the threshold of the night,
Fall from his Ocean-lane of fire,
And sleep beneath his pillar'd light!
How oft the purple-skirted robe
Of twilight slowly downward drawn,
As thro' the slumber of the globe
Again we dash'd into the dawn!
New stars all night above the brim
Of waters lighten'd into view;
They climb'd as quickly, for the rim
Changed every moment as we flew.
Far ran the naked moon across
The houseless ocean's heaving field,
Or flying shone, the silver boss
Of her own halo's dusky shield;
The peaky islet shifted shapes,
High towns on hills were dimly seen,
We past long lines of Northern capes
And dewy Northern meadows green.
We came to warmer waves, and deep
Across the boundless east we drove,
Where those long swells of breaker sweep
The nutmeg rocks and isles of coves.
By peaks that flamed, or, all in shade,
Gloom'd the low coast and quivering brine
With ashy rains, that spreading made
Fantastic plume or sable pine;
By sands and steaming flats and floods,
Of mightly month, we scudded fast,
And hills and scarlet-mingled woods
Glow'd for a moment as we past.
O hundred shores of happy climes,
How swiftly stream'd ye by the bark!
At times the whole sea burn'd, at times
With wakes of fire we tore the dark;
At times a carven craft would shoot
From heavens hid in fairy bowers,
With naked limbs and flowers and fruit,
But we nor paused for fruit nor flowers.
For one fair Vision ever fled
Down the waste waters day and night,
And still we follow'd where she led,
In hope to gain upon her flight.
Her face was ever more unseen,
And fixt upon the far sea-line;
But each man murmur'd, "O, my Queen.
I follow till I make thee mine."
And now we lost her, now she gleam'd
Like fancy made of golden air.
Now nearer to the prow she seem'd
Like Virtue firm, like Knowledge fair
Now high on waves that idly burst
Like Heavenly Hope she crown'd the sea
And now, the bloodless point reversed,
She bore the blade of liberty.
And only one among us - him
We pleased not - he was seldom pleased:
He saw not far: his eyes were dim:
But ours he swore were all diseased.
"A ship of fools," he shriek'd in spite
"A ship of fools," he sneer'd and wept.
And overboard one stormy night
He cast his body, and on we swept.
And never sail of ours was furl'd,
Nor anchor dropt at eve or morn;
We loved the glories of the world,
But laws of nature were our scorn;
For blasts would rise and rave and cease,
But whence were those that drove the sail
Across the whirllwind's heart of peace,
And to and thro' the counter-gale?
Again to colder climes we came,
For still we follow'd where she led:
Now mate is blind and captain lame,
And half the crew are sick or dead.
But blind or lame or sick or sound
We follow that which flies before:
We know the merry world is round,
And we may sail for evermore.

[pp. 267-8]