Читать книгу Poems of Arthur Hugh Clough - Arthur Hugh Clough - Страница 11

Once more the wonted road I tread,

Once more dark heavens above me spread,

Upon the windy down I stand,

My station whence the circling land

Lies mapped and pictured wide below;—

Such as it was, such e’en again,

Long dreary bank, and breadth of plain

By hedge or tree unbroken;—lo!

A few grey woods can only show

How vain their aid, and in the sense

Of one unaltering impotence,

Relieving not, meseems enhance

The sovereign dulness of the expanse.

Yet marks where human hand hath been,

Bare house, unsheltered village, space

Of ploughed and fenceless tilth between

(Such aspect as methinks may be

In some half-settled colony),

From Nature vindicate the scene;

A wide, and yet disheartening view,

A melancholy world.

’Tis true,

Most true; and yet, like those strange smiles

By fervent hope or tender thought

From distant happy regions brought,

Which upon some sick bed are seen

To glorify a pale worn face

With sudden beauty,—so at whiles

Lights have descended, hues have been,

To clothe with half-celestial grace

The bareness of the desert place.

Since so it is, so be it still!

Could only thou, my heart, be taught

To treasure, and in act fulfil

The lesson which the sight has brought:

In thine own dull and dreary state

To work and patiently to wait:

Little thou think’st in thy despair

How soon the o’ershaded sun may shine,

And e’en the dulling clouds combine

To bless with lights and hues divine

That region desolate and bare,

Those sad and sinful thoughts of thine!

Still doth the coward heart complain;

The hour may come, and come in vain;

The branch that withered lies and dead

No suns can force to lift its head.

True!—yet how little thou canst tell

How much in thee is ill or well;

Nor for thy neighbour nor for thee,

Be sure, was life designed to be

A draught of dull complacency.

One Power too is it, who doth give

The food without us, and within

The strength that makes it nutritive;

He bids the dry bones rise and live,

And e’en in hearts depraved to sin

Some sudden, gracious influence,

May give the long-lost good again,

And wake within the dormant sense

And love of good;—for mortal men,

So but thou strive, thou soon shalt see

Defeat itself is victory.

So be it: yet, O Good and Great,

In whom in this bedarkened state

I fain am struggling to believe,

Let me not ever cease to grieve,

Nor lose the consciousness of ill

Within me;—and refusing still

To recognise in things around

What cannot truly there be found,

Let me not feel, nor be it true,

That, while each daily task I do,

I still am giving day by day

My precious things within away

(Those thou didst give to keep as thine)

And casting, do whate’er I may,

My heavenly pearls to earthly swine.

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