Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, SOUL, by FREDERICK WILLIAM HENRY MYERS


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

SOUL, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Soul, that in some world hast made
Last Line: "yet ah—one moment linger here!"
Alternate Author Name(s): Myers, Frederic
Subject(s): Soul


I

"SOUL, that in some high world hast made
Pre-natal unbewailing choice,
Thro' Earth's perplexities of shade
Sternly to suffer and rejoice;—
Breathe in me too thine ardent aim;
Let me too seek thy soaring goal:—
However severed, still the same
My hope with thine, O kindred Soul!

II

"Yet pause. The roaring North has driven
Beyond our ken his foamy car;
Serener than the height of heaven
This summer sea lies near and far;
And flecked with flying shade and shine
Heaves a dove-green, dove-purple breast,
And shimmers to the soft sky-line
Thro' faery solitudes of rest.

III

"No fruit has Ocean's tumult found;
His wave-battalions blindly ran;—
Hushed after all that storm and sound
Old Ocean ends as he began:—
On thee no random angers fell;
Oh, not for naught thy skies were wild!
Thine Angel marked them, measuring well
The storms that should not slay his child.

IV

"Thine eager youth they could not dim;
They left thee slender, left thee fair;
Left the soft life of voice and limb,
The blue, the gold, of eyes, of hair.
Within a sterner change they wrought,—
Beset thy Will with surging wrong,
Smote on the citadels of Thought,
And found thee ready, left thee strong.

V

"Thy worst is over. Pause and hark!
Thine inmost Angel whispers clear,
'We leave the blackness and the dark;
The end is Love, the end is near.'
Lift then anew the lessening weight;
Fight on, to men and angels dear!
Fare forth, brave soul, from fate to fate;—
Yet ah—one moment linger here!"





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