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Alfred Lord Tennyson - In Memoriam A. H. H.
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    The freezing reason`s colder part,
    And like a man in wrath the heart
  Stood up and answer`d "I have felt."

  No, like a child in doubt and fear:
    But that blind clamour made me wise;
    Then was I as a child that cries,
  But, crying, knows his father near;

  And what I am beheld again
    What is, and no man understands;
    And out of darkness came the hands
  That reach thro` nature, moulding men.CXXV
  Whatever I have said or sung,
    Some bitter notes my harp would give,
    Yea, tho` there often seem`d to live
  A contradiction on the tongue,
  Yet Hope had never lost her youth;
    She did but look through dimmer eyes;
    Or Love but play`d with gracious lies, 
  Because he felt so fix`d in truth:
  And if the song were full of care,
    He breathed the spirit of the song;
    And if the words were sweet and strong 
  He set his royal signet there;

  Abiding with me till I sail 
    To seek thee on the mystic deeps, 
    And this electric force, that keeps 
  A thousand pulses dancing, fail.CXXVI
  Love is and was my Lord and King,
    And in his presence I attend
    To hear the tidings of my friend,
  Which every hour his couriers bring.
  Love is and was my King and Lord,
    And will be, tho` as yet I keep
    Within his court on earth, and sleep
  Encompass`d by his faithful guard,
  And hear at times a sentinel
    Who moves about from place to place,
    And whispers to the worlds of space,
  In the deep night, that all is well.CXXVII
  And all is well, tho` faith and form
    Be sunder`d in the night of fear;
    Well roars the storm to those that hear
  A deeper voice across the storm,
  Proclaiming social truth shall spread,
    And justice, ev`n tho` thrice again
    The red fool-fury of the Seine
  Should pile her barricades with dead.
  But ill for him that wears a crown, 
    And him, the lazar, in his rags: 
    They tremble, the sustaining crags;
  The spires of ice are toppled down,

  And molten up, and roar in flood;
    The fortress crashes from on high,
    The brute earth lightens to the sky,
  And the great Æon sinks in blood,

  And compass`d by the fires of Hell;
    While thou, dear spirit, happy star,
    O`erlook`st the tumult from afar, 
  And smilest, knowing all is well.CXXVIII
  The love that rose on stronger wings,
    Unpalsied when he met with Death,
    Is comrade of the lesser faith
  That sees the course of human things.
  No doubt vast eddies in the flood 
    Of onward time shall yet be made, 
    And throned races may degrade;
  Yet, O ye mysteries of good,
  Wild Hours that fly with Hope and Fear,
    If all your office had to do
     With old results that look like new; 
  If this were all your mission here,

  To draw, to sheathe a useless sword,
    To fool the crowd with glorious lies,
    To cleave a creed in sects and cries,
  To change the bearing of a word,

  To shift an arbitrary power,
    To cramp the student at his desk,
    To make old bareness picturesque
  And tuft with grass a feudal tower;

  Why then my scorn might well descend
    On you and yours. I see in part
    That all, as in some piece of art,
  Is toil cöoperant to an end.CXXIX
  Dear friend, far off, my lost desire,
    So far, so near in woe and weal;
    O loved the most, when most I feel
  There is a lower and a higher;
  Known and unknown; human, divine;
    Sweet human hand and lips and eye;
    Dear heavenly friend that canst not die,
  Mine, mine, for ever, ever mine;
  Strange friend, past, present, and to be;
    Loved deeplier, darklier understood;
    Behold, I dream a dream of good,
  And mingle all the world with thee.CXXX
  Thy voice is on the rolling air;
    I hear thee where the waters run;
    Thou standest in the rising sun, 
  And in the setting thou art fair.
  What art thou then? I cannot guess;
    But tho` I seem in star and flower
    To feel thee some diffusive power, 
  I do not therefore love thee less:
  My love involves the love before;
    My love is vaster passion now;
    Tho` mix`d with God and Nature thou, 
  I seem to love thee more and more.

  Far off thou art, but ever nigh;
    I have thee still, and I rejoice;
    I prosper, circled with thy voice; 
  I shall not lose thee tho` I die.CXXXI
  O living will that shalt endure
    When all that seems shall suffer shock,
  Rise in the spiritual rock,
    Flow thro` our deeds and make them pure,
  That we may lift from out of dust
    A voice as unto him that hears,
  A cry above the conquer`d years
    To one that with us works, and trust,
  With faith that comes of self-control,
    The truths that never can be proved
  Until we close with all we loved,
    And all we flow from, soul in soul.Epilogue
  O true and tried, so well and long,
    Demand not thou a marriage lay;
  In that it is thy marriage day
    Is music more than any song.
  Nor have I felt so much of bliss
    Since first he told me that he loved
  A daughter of our house; nor proved
    Since that dark day a day like this;
  Tho` I since then have number`d o`er
    Some thrice three years: they went and came,
  Remade the blood and changed the frame,
    And yet is love not less, but more;

  No longer caring to embalm
    In dying songs a dead regret,
  But like a statue solid-set,
    And moulded in colossal calm.

  Regret is dead, but love is more
    Than in the summers that are flown,
  For I myself with these have grown 
    To something greater than before;

  Which makes appear the songs I made
    As echoes out of weaker times,
  As half but idle brawling rhymes, 
    The sport of random sun and shade.

  But where is she, the bridal flower,
    That must be made a wife ere noon?
  She enters, glowing like the moon
    Of Eden on its bridal bower:

  On me she bends her blissful eyes
    And then on thee; they meet thy look
  And brighten like the star that shook 
    Betwixt the palms of paradise.

  O when her life was yet in bud,
    He too foretold the perfect rose.
    For thee she grew, for thee she grows 
  For ever, and as fair as good.

  And thou art worthy; full of power;
    As gentle; liberal-minded, great,
    Consistent; wearing all that weight 
  Of learning lightly like a flower.

  But now set out: the noon is near,
    And I must give away the bride;
    She fears not, or with thee beside 
  And me behind her, will not fear.

  For I that danced her on my knee,
    That watch`d her on her nurse`s arm,
    That shielded all her life from harm
  At last must part with her to thee;

  Now waiting to be made a wife,
    Her feet, my darling, on the dead
    Their pensive tablets round her head,
  And the most living words of life

  Breathed in her ear. The ring is on,
    The `wilt thou` answer`d, and again
    The `wilt thou` ask`d, till out of twain
  Her sweet "I will" has made you one.

  Now sign your names, which shall be read,
    Mute symbols of a joyful morn,
    By village eyes as yet unborn;
  The names are sign`d, and overhead

  Begins the clash and clang that tells
    The joy to every wandering breeze;
    The blind wall rocks, and on the trees
  The dead leaf trembles to the bells.

  O happy hour, and happier hours
    Await them. Many a merry face
    Salutes them — maidens of the place,
  That pelt us in the porch with flowers.

  O happy hour, behold the bride
    With him to whom her hand I gave.
    They leave the porch, they pass the grave
  That has to-day its sunny side.

  To-day the grave is bright for me,
    For them the light of life increased,
    Who stay to share the morning feast,
  Who rest to-night beside the sea.

  Let all my genial spirits advance
    To meet and greet a whiter sun;
    My drooping memory will not shun
  The foaming grape of eastern France.

  It circles round, and fancy plays,
    And hearts are warm`d and faces bloom,
    As drinking health to bride and groom
  We wish them store of happy days.

  Nor count me all to blame if I
    Conjecture of a stiller guest,
    Perchance, perchance, among the rest,
  And, tho` in silence, wishing joy.

  But they must go, the time draws on,
    And those white-favour`d horses wait;
    They rise, but linger; it is late;
  Farewell, we kiss, and they are gone.

  A shade falls on us like the dark
    From little cloudlets on the grass,
    But sweeps away as out we pass
  To range the woods, to roam the park,

  Discussing how their courtship grew,
    And talk of others that are wed,
    And how she look`d, and what he said,
  And back we come at fall of dew.


  Again the feast, the speech, the glee,
    The shade of passing thought, the wealth
    Of words and wit, the double health,
  The crowning cup, the three-times-three,


  And last the dance; — till I retire:
    Dumb is that tower which spake so loud,
    And high in heaven the streaming cloud,
  And on the downs a rising fire:


  And rise, O moon, from yonder down,
    Till over down and over dale
    All night the shining vapour sail
  And pass the silent-lighted town,


  The white-faced halls, the glancing rills, 
    And catch at every mountain head,
    And o`er the friths that branch and spread 
  Their sleeping silver thro` the hills;


  And touch with shade the bridal doors,
    With tender gloom the roof, the wall;
    And breaking let the splendour fall
  To spangle all the happy shores


  By which they rest, and ocean sounds,
    And, star and system rolling past,
    A soul shall draw from out the vast
  And strike his being into bounds,


  And, moved thro` life of lower phase,
    Result in man, be born and think,
    And act and love, a closer link
  Betwixt us and the crowning race


  Of those that, eye to eye, shall look
    On knowledge; under whose command
    Is Earth and Earth`s, and in their hand
  Is Nature like an open book;


  No longer half-akin to brute,
    For all we thought and loved and did,
    And hoped, and suffer`d, is but seed
  Of what in them is flower and fruit;


  Whereof the man, that with me trod
    This planet, was a noble type
    Appearing ere the times were ripe,
  That friend of mine who lives in God,


  That God, which ever lives and loves,
    One God, one law, one element,
    And one far-off divine event,
  To which the whole creation moves.
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