Classic and Contemporary Poetry
THE UNKNOWN GOD, by WILLIAM WATSON Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: When, overarched by gorgeous night Last Line: The unknown god, the unknown god. Alternate Author Name(s): Watson, John William Subject(s): God; Religion; Theology | ||||||||
WHEN, overarched by gorgeous night, I wave my trivial self away; When all I was to all men's sight Shares the erasure of the day; Then do I cast my cumbering load, Then do I gain a sense of God. Not him that with fantastic boasts A sombre people dreamed they knew; The mere barbaric God of Hosts That edged their sword and braced their thew: A God they pitted 'gainst a swarm Of neighbour Gods less vast of arm; A God like some imperious king, Wroth, were his realm not duly awed; A God for ever harkening Unto his self-commanded laud; A God for ever jealous grown Of carven wood and graven stone; A God whose ghost, in arch and aisle, Yet haunts his temple -- and his tomb; But follows in a little while Odin and Zeus to equal doom; A God of kindred seed and line; Man's giant shadow, hailed divine. O streaming worlds, O crowded sky, O Life, and mine own soul's abyss, Myself am scarce so small that I Should bow to Deity like this! This my Begetter? This was what Man in his violent youth begot. The God I know of, I shall ne'er Know, though he dwells exceeding nigh. Raise thou the stone and find me there, Cleave thou the wood and there am I. Yea, in my flesh his spirit doth flow, Too near, too far, for me to know. Whate'er my deeds, I am not sure That I can pleasure him or vex: I that must use a speech so poor It narrows the Supreme with sex. Notes he the good or ill in man? To hope he cares is all I can. I hope -- with fear. For did I trust This vision granted me at birth, The sire of heaven would seem less just Than many a faulty son of earth. And so he seems indeed! But then, I trust it not, this bounded ken. And dreaming much, I never dare To dream that in my prisoned soul The flutter of a trembling prayer Can move the Mind that is the Whole, Though kneeling nations watch and yearn, Does the primordial purpose turn? Best by remembering God, say some, We keep our high imperial lot. Fortune, I fear, hath oftenest come When we forgot -- when we forgot! A lovelier faith their happier crown, But history laughs and weeps it down! Know they not well, how seven times seven, Wronging our mighty arms with rust, We dared not do the work of heaven Lest heaven should hurl us in the dust? The work of heaven! 'Tis waiting still The sanction of the heavenly will. Unmeet to be profaned by praise Is he whose coils the world enfold; The God on whom I ever gaze, The God I never once behold: Above the cloud, beneath the clod: The Unknown God, the Unknown God. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...MYSTIC BOUNCE by TERRANCE HAYES MATHEMATICS CONSIDERED AS A VICE by ANTHONY HECHT UNHOLY SONNET 11 by MARK JARMAN SHINE, PERISHING REPUBLIC by ROBINSON JEFFERS THE COMING OF THE PLAGUE by WELDON KEES |
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