Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, FAREWELL, by WILLIAM HERBERT (1778-1847)


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

FAREWELL, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Reader, whoe'er hast travell'd to the goal
Last Line: Sink unregarded in forgetfulness!
Subject(s): Farewell; Parting


READER, whoe'er hast travell'd to the goal
Through this long chant unwearied, if my verse,
Tuned to no trivial strain, hast lent thee aught
Of pleasure or of profit, o'er the work
Wrought by the chaste artificer of song
Bend kindly, yielding such small meed of praise
Earn'd by high musing, as may send his name
Not ill-esteem'd upon the wings of Time
Unto his children's children, when the sod
Shall lie upon the hand that gave it life,
Calling the soul's unborn imaginings
From thought's deep fountain; like the glowing forms
Of Eros and his brother, who uprose
From their wet cradle at the wizard's voice,
This mournful, o'er his neck the jetty locks
With hyacinthine ringlets clustering,
That blythe and golden as the god of day.
Perchance I shall not walk with thee again
Along the Muse's haunt, and we shall both
Be number'd with the countless things that lie
O'ershadow'd by oblivion; hearts that beat
High in the noontide of ambitious hopes,
And forms of loveliest symmetry, that once
Delighted the beholder, by the hand,
Which deals just measure unto all that tread
This changeful world, o'ertaken in their dream
Of summer joy. Calm reason throws a cloud
O'er the enchantment of aspiring thoughts
Which whisper of a life beyond the tomb
Upon the lips of men, and tells how vain
The shadow of such glory, nothing worth
To him who hath his dwelling with the worm.
But that Almighty will, which placed man here
To labour in his calling, hath set deep
Within his bosom an undying hope,
An aspiration unto nobler ends
Than he hath compass'd yet; a stirring thirst
For praise beyond the term that nature's law
Has granted to his brief mortality,
This, ever of the gloomy monitor
Regardless, bids him peril much, to win
The unsubstantial fame, which unto him
Shall be as if not being; a sweet strain
Of soul-enrapturing music to the deaf,
A scene of beauty and of light to eyes
That lie in darkness, and by slumber seal'd
Without the sense of vision. Strange, forsooth,
Appear the workings of the mind of man,
Which goad him to his loss. The promised boon
Of that stupendous glory, which shall be
Hereafter, and survive the wreck of worlds
Unto the end of Time, wants substance now
To wrestle with his sense of present good;
That which is lighter than a transient gleam
Of sunshine or the shadow of a shade
Reflected from a mirror, and, if gain'd,
Can never be by any sense of his
Enjoy'd or apprehended, the vain wish
To float upon the memory of men
After his term of being oft becomes
A master passion, and for that one aim
He barters all, that his Creator gave
Of joy or solace in the vale of life,
And that inheritance of perfect bliss
Which might be his for ever. Then happy they
Who in the airy building of a name,
Have travell'd through the guiltless ways of peace
Innocuous, and held the mind's calm eye
Fix'd on a better star than those vague fires,
Which, fatuous, tole man to the abyss. Time was,
Nor will return, when poesy might rear
A more perennial monument than brass,
Towering above the age-worn edifice,
Where loath'd corruption saith unto the worm,
"Thou art my sister." The famed capitol
No longer sees the silent virgin climb
Its marble steps, nor does the pomp profane
Of sacrificial pontiffs crowd its ways;
Yet still the chaplet blooms, wherewith the muse
Inwreathed the forehead of Venusium's bard
Fragrant and fresh, while ages fling their dust
Upon the crumbling domes, with which he claim'd
Coeval glory. But the boast that told
Of sepulchres by magic verse uppiled,
Which neither storms nor all consuming Time
Should bring to nothingness, would perish now
Even in the utterance. I have yet beheld
But half an age, yet in that petty space
Such giant forms of havoc and of change
Have glided o'er the earth, that the mazed thought
Dwells little on the past, but gazing forth,
Like the Ebudan seer, with ravishment
Strains after what shall be. The ear is cloy'd
Unto satiety with honied strains
That daily from the fount of Helicon
Flow murmuring; and that which is to-day
Inshrined upon the lip of praise, shall be
To-morrow a tale told, a shadow pass'd
Into those regions where oblivion throws
Over the bright creations of the mind
A darkness as of death. Scared learning flies
An age, which bubbling with unnumber'd tongues
In quest of some new wonder hurries on,
And hath no retrospect. Enough for me,
That this my tuneful labour, short howe'er
Its term of glory, hath my solace been
Through many a wintry hour, when icy chains
Bound the froze champaign; a sweet anodyne
To inward cares, lulling the tremulous heart
That throbs with high aspirings, and would fain
Live unreproach'd upon the rolls of fame,
Mindful of its Creator, who requires
From each with usury the gifts He gave,
And stirs by inborn thirst of good report
Man to his noblest uses. To have walk'd
No servile follower, nor vainly trick'd
With meretricious gauds of modern song,
Beneath Aovian umbrage never sere,
Where Melesigenes and Maro sang,
Where British Milton gave his country's lyre
A voice from ancient days, hath been to me
A charm illusive, a refreshing toil
Year after year. My little bark, o'er which
Long fashioning thy symmetry I hung,
Now launch'd upon the ocean wide of Time,
Whose winds are evil tongues, and passions roused
Amidst the warring multitude its storms,
Sore shall I miss thee! like the child, first sent
From the safe home, where fond parental cares
Watch'd o'er his growing energies. Go forth
Unto thy destinies, and fare unharm'd
Adown the current, which may waft thee soon
To that Lethean pool, where earthly toils
Sink unregarded in forgetfulness!





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