Classic and Contemporary Poetry
HILLCREST, by EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: No sound of any storm that shakes Last Line: No louder now than falling leaves. | ||||||||
(To Mrs. Edward MacDowell) No sound of any storm that shakes Old island walls with older seas Comes here where now September makes An island in a sea of trees. Between the sunlight and the shade A man may learn till he forgets The roaring of a world remade, And all his ruins and regrets; And if he still remembers here Poor fights he may have won or lost,-- If he be ridden with the fear Of what some other fight may cost,-- If, eager to confuse too soon, What he has known with what may be, He reads a planet out of tune For cause of his jarred harmony,-- If here he venture to unroll His index of adagios, And he be given to console Humanity with what he knows,-- He may by contemplation learn A little more than what he knew, And even see great oaks return To acorns out of which they grew. He may, if he but listen well, Through twilight and the silence here Be told what there are none may tell To vanity's impatient ear; And he may never dare again Say what awaits him, or be sure What sunlit labyrinth of pain He may not enter and endure. Who knows to-day from yesterday May learn to count no thing too strange: Love builds of what Time takes away, Till Death itself is less than Change. Who sees enough in his duress May go as far as dreams have gone; Who sees a little may do less Than many who are blind have done; Who sees unchastened here the soul Triumphant has no other sight Than has a child who sees the whole World radiant with his own delight. Far journeys and hard wandering Await him in whose crude surmise Peace, like a mask, hides everything That is and has been from his eyes; And all his wisdom is unfound, Or like a web that error weaves On airy looms that have a sound No louder now than falling leaves. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...AN EVANGELIST'S WIFE by EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON AN ISLAND (SAINT HELENA, 1821) by EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON ANOTHER DARK LADY by EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON BALLADE OF DEAD FRIENDS by EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON CAPUT MORTUUM by EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON CHARLES CARVILLE'S EYES by EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON CORTEGE by EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON DEMOS by EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON DOCTOR OF BILLIARDS by EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON ERASMUS by EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON |
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