Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, FIVE GREAT ODES, SELECTION, by PAUL CLAUDEL


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

FIVE GREAT ODES, SELECTION, by                    
First Line: But what matter all things seen, to the eye that makes me behold them?
Last Line: And here too is the new surging of the year.
Subject(s): Odes (as Poetic Form)


But what matter all things seen, to the eye that makes me behold them?
And the life I hold, if I yield it not, and all that is strange to me,
And all that is other than Thyself,
And this death beside Thy Life that we call my life!
I am worn with vanity. Behold how I submit to vanity without desire.
Wherefore do I look without pleasure on Thy works!
Tell me no more of the rose! No fruit retaineth its savour.
What is the death that Thou hast spared me beside the Truth of Thy Presence
And the indestructible void that I am
With which I must uphold Thee?
O weariness of days! I can endure no longer, I am as one who leans his hand
against the wail.
Day follows after day, and behold, the hour when the sun stays in its course!
Here is the harshness of winter, the affrights and the shocks of immobility,
Here is inexorable cold, here is God singly!
In you I am anterior to death!
And here too is the new surging of the year.





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