Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, ENGLAND: AN ODE, by ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE


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ENGLAND: AN ODE, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Sea and strand, and a lordlier land than sea-tides rolling and rising sun
Last Line: Sea.
Subject(s): England; Justice; Sea; English; Ocean


I.

SEA and strand, and a lordlier land than sea-tides rolling and rising sun
Clasp and lighten in climes that brighten with day when day that was here is
done,
Call aloud on their children, proud with trust that future and past are one.

Far and near from the swan's nest here the storm-birds bred of her fair white
breast,
Sons whose home was the sea-wave's foam, have borne the fame of her east and
west;
North and south has the storm-wind's mouth rung praise of England and England's
quest.

Fame, wherever her flag flew, never forbore to fly with an equal wing:
France and Spain with their warrior train bowed down before her as thrall to
king;
India knelt at her feet, and felt her sway more fruitful of life than spring.

Darkness round them as iron bound fell off from races of elder name,
Slain at sight of her eyes, whose light bids freedom lighten and burn as flame;
Night endures not the touch that cures of kingship tyrants, and slaves of shame.

All the terror of time, where error and fear were lords of a world of slaves,
Age on age in resurgent rage and anguish darkening as waves on waves,
Fell or fled from a face that shed such grace as quickens the dust of graves.

Things of night at her glance took flight: the strengths of darkness recoiled
and sank:
Sank the fires of the murderous pyres where-on wild agony writhed and shrank:
Rose the light of the reign of right from gulfs of years that the darkness
drank.

Yet the might of her wings in flight, whence glory lightens and music rings,
Loud and bright as the dawn's, shall smite and still the discord of evil things,
Yet not slain by her radiant reign, but darkened now by her sail-stretched
wings.

II.

Music made of change and conquest, glory born of evil slain,
Stilled the discord, slew the darkness, bade the lights of tempest wane,
Where the deathless dawn of England rose in sign that right should reign.

Mercy, where the tiger wallowed mad and blind with blood and lust,
Justice, where the jackal yelped and fed, and slaves allowed it just,
Rose as England's light on Asia rose, and smote them down to dust.

Justice bright as mercy, mercy girt by justice with her sword,
Smote and saved and raised and ruined, till the tyrant-ridden horde
Saw the lightning fade from heaven and knew the sun for God and lord.

Where the footfall sounds of England, where the smile of England shines,
Rings the tread and laughs the face of freedom, fair as hope divines
Days to be, more brave than ours and lit by lordlier stars for signs.

All our past acclaims our future: Shakespeare's voice and Nelson's hand,
Milton's faith and Wordsworth's trust in this our chosen and chainless land,
Bear us witness: come the world against her, England yet shall stand.

Earth and sea bear England witness if he lied who said it; he
Whom the winds that ward her, waves that clasp, and herb and flower and tree
Fed with English dews and sunbeams, hail as more than man may be.

No man ever spake as he that bade our England be but true,
Keep but faith with England fast and firm, and none should bid her rue;
None may speak as he: but all may know the sign that Shakespeare knew.

III.

From the springs of the dawn, from the depths of the noon, from the heights of
the night that shine,
Hope, faith, and remembrance of glory that found but in England her throne and
her shrine,
Speak louder than song may proclaim them, that here is the seal of them set for
a sign.

And loud as the sea's voice thunders applause of the land that is one with the
sea
Speaks Time in the ear of the people that never at heart was not inly free
The word of command that assures us of life, if we will but that life shall be;

If the race that is first of the races of men who behold unashamed the sun
Stand fast and forget not the sign that is given of the years and the wars that
are done,
The token that all who are born of its blood should in heart as in blood be one.

The word of remembrance that lightens as fire from the steeps of the storm-lit
past
Bids only the faith of our fathers endure in us, firm as they held it fast:
That the glory which was from the first upon England alone may endure to the
last.

That the love and the hate may change not, the faith may not fade, nor the wrath
nor scorn,
That shines for her sons and that burns for her foemen as fire of the night or
the morn:
That the births of her womb may forget not the sign of the glory wherein they
were born.

A light that is more than the sunlight, an air that is brighter than morning's
breath,
Clothes England about as the strong sea clasps her, and answers the word that it
saith;
The word that assures her of life if she change not, and choose not the ways of
death.

Change darkens and lightens around her, alternate in hope and in fear to be:
Hope knows not if fear speak truth, nor fear whether hope be not blind as she:
But the sun is in heaven that beholds her immortal, and girdled with life by the
sea.





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