Why are we weigh'd upon with heaviness, And utterly consum'd with sharp distress, While all things else have rest from weariness?

All things have rest: why should we toil alone,

We only toil, who are the first of things,
And make perpetual moan,

Still from one sorrow to another thrown:
Nor never fold our wings,
And cease from wanderings,

Nor steep our brows in slumber's holy balm;
Nor harken what the inner spirit sings,
"There is no joy but calm!”

Why should we only toil, the roof and crown of things?

III

Lo! in the middle of the wood,

The folded leaf is wooed from out the bud
With winds upon the branch, and there
Grows green and broad, and takes no care,
Sun-steep'd at noon, and in the moon
Nightly dew-fed; and turning yellow
Falls, and floats adown the air.
Lo! sweeten'd with the summer light,
The full-juiced apple, waxing over-mellow,
Drops in a silent autumn night.
All its allotted length of days,
The flower ripens in its place,

Ripens and fades, and falls, and hath no toil,
Fast-rooted in the fruitful soil.

IV

Hateful is the dark-blue sky,
Vaulted o'er the dark-blue sea.

Death is the end of life; ah, why
Should life all labor be?

Let us alone. Time driveth onward fast,
And in a little while our lips are dumb.
Let us alone. What is it that will last?
All things are taken from us, and become

Portions and parcels of the dreadful Past.
Let us alone. What pleasure can we have
To war with evil? Is there any peace
In ever climbing up the climbing wave?
All things have rest, and ripen toward the
grave

In silence; ripen, fall, and cease:
Give us long rest or death, dark death, or
dreamful ease.

V

How sweet it were, hearing the downward stream,

With half-shut eyes ever to seem
Falling asleep in a half-dream!

To dream and dream, like yonder amber
light,
Which will not leave the myrrh-bush on the
height;

To hear each other's whisper'd speech;
Eating the Lotos day by day,

To watch the crisping ripples on the beach,
And tender curving lines of creamy spray;
To lend our hearts and spirits wholly
To the influence of mild-minded melan-
choly;

To muse and brood and live again in mem

The Lotos blooms below the barren peak: The Lotos blows by every winding creek: All day the wind breathes low with mellower tone:

Thro' every hollow cave and alley lone Round and round the spicy downs the yellow Lotos-dust is blown.

We have had enough of action, and of motion we,

Roll'd to starboard, roll'd to larboard, when the surge was seething free, Where the wallowing monster spouted his foam-fountains in the sea.

Let us swear an oath, and keep it with an equal mind,

In the hollow Lotos-land to live and lie reclin'd

On the hills like Gods together, careless of mankind.

For they lie beside their nectar, and the bolts are hurl'd

Far below them in the valleys, and the clouds are lightly curl'd

Round their golden houses, girdled with the gleaming world:

Where they smile in secret, looking over wasted lands,

Blight and famine, plague and earthquake, roaring deeps and fiery sands, Clanging fights, and flaming towns, and sinking ships, and praying hands. But they smile, they find a music centred in a doleful song

Steaming up, a lamentation and an ancient tale of wrong,

Like a tale of little meaning tho' the words are strong;

Chanted from an ill-us'd race of men that cleave the soil,

Sow the seed, and reap the harvest with enduring toil,

Storing yearly little dues of wheat, and wine and oil;

Till they perish and they suffer-some, 't is whisper'd-down in hell Suffer endless anguish, others in Elysian valleys dwell,

Resting weary limbs at last on beds of asphodel.

Surely, surely, slumber is more sweet than toil, the shore

Than labor in the deep mid-ocean, wind and wave and oar;

Oh rest ye, brother mariners, we will not wander more.

That lov'd me, and alone; on shore, and when

Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades
Vex'd the dim sea. I am become a name ;
For always roaming with a hungry heart
Much have I seen and known: cities of men
And manners, climates, councils, govern-
ments,

Myself not least, but honor'd of them all;
And drunk delight of battle with my peers,
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.
I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'

Gleams that untravell'd world, whose margin fades

For ever and for ever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use!
As tho' to breathe were life. Life pil'd on
life

Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains: but every hour is sav'd
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard
myself,

And this gray spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.

This is my son, mine own Telemachus,
To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle -
Well-lov'd of me, discerning to fulfil
This labor, by slow prudence to make mild
A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees
Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere
Of common duties, decent not to fail
In offices of tenderness, and pay
Meet adoration to my household gods,
When I am gone. He works his work, I

Old age hath yet his honor and his toil; Death closes all; but something ere the end, Some work of noble note, may yet be done, Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods. The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks: The long day wanes : the slow moon climbs : the deep

Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,

"T is not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down :
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.

Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho' We are not now that strength which in old days

Mov'd earth and heaven, that which we

are, we are :

One equal temper of heroic hearts, Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

SIR GALAHAD

My good blade carves the casques of men,
My tough lance thrusteth sure,
My strength is as the strength of ten,
Because my heart is pure.

The shattering trumpet shrilleth high,
The hard brands shiver on the steel,
The splinter'd spear-shafts crack and fly,
The horse and rider reel :

They reel, they roll in clanging lists,

And when the tide of combat stands, Perfume and flowers fall in showers,

That lightly rain from ladies' hands.

How sweet are looks that ladies bend
On whom their favors fall!
For them I battle till the end,

To save from shame and thrall:
But all my heart is drawn above,

My knees are bow'd in crypt and shrine: I never felt the kiss of love,

Nor maiden's hand in mine. More bounteous aspects on me beam, Me mightier transports move and thrill; So keep I fair thro' faith and prayer A virgin heart in work and will.

When down the stormy crescent goes,
A light before me swims,
Between dark stems the forest glows,
I hear a noise of hymns:
Then by some secret shrine I ride;

I hear a voice, but none are there ;
The stalls are void, the doors are wide,
The tapers burning fair.
Fair gleams the snowy altar-cloth,

The silver vessels sparkle clean, The shrill bell rings, the censer swings, And solemn chaunts resound between.

Sometimes on lonely mountain-meres I find a magic bark;

I leap on board: no helmsman steers : I float till all is dark.

A gentle sound, an awful light!
Three angels bear the holy Grail:
With folded feet, in stoles of white,
On sleeping wings they sail.
Ah, blessed vision! blood of God!
My spirit beats her mortal bars,
As down dark tides the glory slides,
And star-like mingles with the stars.

When on my goodly charger borne
Thro' dreaming towns I go,

The cock crows ere the Christmas morn,
The streets are dumb with snow.
The tempest crackles on the leads,
And, ringing, springs from brand and
mail;

But o'er the dark a glory spreads,

And gilds the driving hail.
I leave the plain, I climb the height;
No branchy thicket shelter yields;
But blessed forms in whistling storms
Fly o'er waste fens and windy fields.

A maiden knight-to me is given
Such hope, I know not fear;

I yearn to breathe the airs of heaven
That often meet me here.

I muse on joy that will not cease,
Pure spaces cloth'd in living beams,
Pure lilies of eternal peace,

Whose odors haunt my dreams;
And, stricken by an angel's hand,
This mortal armor that I wear,
This weight and size, this heart and eyes,
Are touch'd, are turn'd to finest air.

The clouds are broken in the sky, And thro' the mountain-walls

A rolling organ-harmony

Swells up, and shakes and falls. Then move the trees, the copses nod, Wings flutter, voices hover clear: "O just and faithful knight of God! Ride on the prize is near." So pass I hostel, hall, and grange; By bridge and ford, by park and pale, All-arm'd I ride, whate'er betide, Until I find the holy Grail.

SIR LAUNCELOT AND QUEEN

GUINEVERE

LIKE Souls that balance joy and pain, With tears and smiles from heaven again

The maiden Spring upon the plain
Came in a sun-lit fall of rain.

In crystal vapor everywhere
Blue isles of heaven laugh'd between,
And far, in forest-deeps unseen,
The topmost elm-tree gather'd green
From draughts of balmy air.

Sometimes the linnet pip'd his song:
Sometimes the throstle whistled strong
Sometimes the sparhawk, wheel'd along,
Hush'd all the groves from fear of wrong:
By grassy capes with fuller sound
In curves the yellowing river ran,
And drooping chestnut-buds began
To spread into the perfect fan,

Above the teeming ground.

Now on some twisted ivy-net,
Now by some tinkling rivulet,
In mosses mix'd with violet
Her cream-white mule his pastern set:
And fleeter now she skimm'd the plains
Than she whose elfin prancer springs
By night to eery warblings,
When all the glimmering moorland rings
With jingling bridle-reins.

As fast she fled thro' sun and shade,
The happy winds upon her play'd,
Blowing the ringlet from the braid:
She look'd so lovely, as she sway'd

The rein with dainty finger-tips,
A man had given all other bliss,
And all his worldly worth for this,
To waste his whole heart in one kiss
Upon her perfect lips.

BREAK, BREAK, BREAK BREAK, break, break,

On thy cold gray stones, O Sea! And I would that my tongue could utter The thoughts that arise in me.