Poetry Explorer


Classic and Contemporary Poetry


I CHAFE AT DARKNESS by GEORGE MEREDITH

Poet Analysis

First Line: I CHAFE AT DARKNESS IN THE NIGHT
Last Line: WAVING SEEM.
Subject(s): DEATH; NIGHT; DEAD, THE; BEDTIME;

I CHAFE at darkness in the night,
But when 'tis light,
Hope shuts her eyes; the clouds are pale;
The fields stretch cold into a distance hard:
I wish again to draw the veil
Thousand-starred.

Am I of them whose blooms are shed,
Whose fruits are spent,
Who from dead eyes see Life half dead; --
Because desire is feeble discontent?
Ah, no! desire and hope should die,
Thus were I.

But in me something clipped of wing
Within its ring
Frets; for I have lost what made
The dawn-breeze magic, and the twilight beam
A hand with tidings o'er the glade
Waving seem.



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