Ah, I must follow it high and low, Tho' it leave me cold to your human touch! Some starry sorcery made me so; And from my birth have I been such. What is it I follow so secret-lone? Over the hills and along the sea? Beauty with every seed is sown, For you, for them, for me? Not so, by the gods! Do I not hear In the night a tender-muffled crying, Rising, falling, sinking, dying? Oh, I must follow it thro' the world! Not so, by the gods! When the dawn-wind stirs, Rustling over the river-reeds, Trembling over the wet pastures, Shall I not follow it, whither it leads? Oh, wild and sad, oh, wild and sweet, Is the lonely horn that I always hear, Blown from the place where all streams meet, Where all horizons disappear! The long sea-tides bring home to port, Their ships by many a moonlit wharf, But an ebbing twilight carries my thought Beyond every coast it would anchor off. Like a reef-bell rocking and ringing low, Under a grey and rain-swept sky, The beauty I follow doth come and go, And if I found it, I should die. The wild-bird of my longing sings Always in the next hollow, And always, always it spreads its wings, When I cross the hill to follow. Ah! Once when the burning noon was poured On moss and stone and dreaming sod, I saw the great blue flower that God Made for the Son of God. And do you think I can go content, With the beauty we meet with everywhere, When I have breathed that flower's scent And seen it melt into the air? Oh, I must follow it high and low, Though it leave me cold to your human touch, Some starry sorcery made me so; And from my birth have I been such. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...EXPLICATION OF AN IMAGINARY TEXT by JAMES GALVIN SIMON SURNAMED PETER by EDGAR LEE MASTERS THE LIGHTED WINDOW by SARA TEASDALE THE BALLAD OF THE OYSTERMAN by OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES THE PRESENT CRISIS by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL THE MILKING-MAID by CHRISTINA GEORGINA ROSSETTI BORDER BALLAD [OR MARCH, OR SONG], FR. THE MONASTERY by WALTER SCOTT |