Alone on this desolate border -- On this ruggedest, rim'd frontier, Where the hills huddle up in disorder Like a fold in mortal fear -- Where the mountains are out at the elbow, And their yellow coats seedy and sere -- Where the river runs sullen and yellow This dismalest day of the year. I go up and down on the granite, Like an unholy ghost under bans. Oh, Christ! for the eloquent quiet! For the final folding of hands! What am I? Where am I going? I look at the lizard that glides Over the mossy boulder With green epaulets on his sides. My feet are in dust to the ankles, My heart, it is dustier still; Will never the dust be levelled Till the heart is laid under the hill? Why this yearning and longing? This dull desolation and void? Pussy cat seeking a corner? Alone! yet for ever annoyed? I look at the sun shining over, A cloud is swinging on hinges And is trying his glory to cover. But see! his beams in the fringes Are tangled and fastened in falling, And a sailor above us is calling "Untangle the ravels and fringes." In grim battle lines above us Gray, oarless ships are wheeling -- A flash -- a crash appalling -- A hurling of red-hot spears -- Hark to the thunder calling In fierce infernal chorus. Now silver sails are falling Like silver sheens before us. What Nelson to fame aspires In the chartless bluer deep Where navies and armies track? Lo! I have seen their fires At night as they bivouac; And they battle, and bleed, and weep, For this rain is warm as tears. Oh! why was I ever a dreamer? Better a brute on the plain, Or one who believes his redeemer Is greed, and gold, and gain, Or one who can riot and revel, Than be pierced with intolerable pain Of poesy darling, in travail, That will not be born from the brain. O bride by the breathing ocean With lustrous and brimming eye, Pour out the Lethean potion Till a lustrum rolleth by, Lulling a soul's commotion, Plashing against the sky -- Calming a living spectre With its two hands tossed on high. Are sea winds mild and mellow Where my sun-browned babies are, A-weaving silk and yellow Seamed sunbeams in their hair? Go on and on in disorder O cloud with the silver rim, While tangled up in your border The glinting sunbeams swim. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE BISHOP ORDERS HIS TOMB AT SAINT PRAXED'S CHURCH by ROBERT BROWNING IN HOSPITAL: 4. BEFORE by WILLIAM ERNEST HENLEY BILL AND JOE by OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES THE MORAL FABLES: THE WOLF AND THE WETHER by AESOP ANTIMENIDAS by ALCAEUS OF MYTILENE TO SLEEP, WHEN SICK OF A FEVER by PHILIP AYRES |