---

Robert Laurence Binyon - Malham Cove
Work rating: Low

There is threat in the wind, and a murmur
 of water that swells
 Swift in the hollow: about me
 a shadow is thrown;
 For above is no valley sequestered
 in shy, green dells,
 But abrupt, sky--closing, a wall
 and a vastness of stone.
 Did the rock split asunder with ages?
 or suddenly smote
 The hand of a God on the mountain?
 for under the face
 Of the imminent height, at the humid
 and cold rock--base,
 From out of the dungeoned recesses,
 the cavernous throat,
 Disimprisoned there bursts, not a rill,
 not a trickle of spray,
 But broad in its gushing and full
 and sweeping apace
 A river arisen that dances
 in laughter away.

 Builded aloof; unscaleable;
 towering stark
 To the fugitive cloud and the blue,
 O Soul of the Rock!
 Silent, remote as the moon,
 that will`st not to hark
 To the cry of the lamb on the precipice
 lost from the flock;
 If thou suffer the pine in thy cranny
 that dizzily clings
 Small--seen as a fern, or a thicket
 of obstinate thorn,
 `Tis disdain that neglects them, O rather
 a scorning of scorn,
 Unheedful of them as of those
 irresistible springs
 Gushing out from beneath thee, unheard
 as the cry of the bird
 That skims from the shadow and hovers
 a flashing of wings
 Mid the flush and the greening of April,--
 thou standest unstirred

 As a desert uplifted, a desert
 where bones rot and bleach,
 As a barrenness knowing not change
 nor date nor event,
 As a strength without speech, without motion,
 yet stronger than speech;
 A bulk without feature, a winter
 of force long spent;
 And neither is hope, nor terror,
 nor weakness there,
 But a pressure and weight of oblivion
 where no man is known,
 Nor feature from feature distinguished
 but all overthrown;
page 
 Like the rampart of Time that confronts us
 enormous and bare,
 Immuring the dream and the vision
 whereby we have breath;
 Like Night and the end of the light
 to them that despair:
 I stand in thy shadow and fear thee,
 thou greatness of Death!

 Come away, come away! There is light
 in the water that glides;
 Come away with the water that hastes
 from the heart of the hills,
 A sinuous ripple that sings
 and that nowhere abides,
 But broken, a murmuring sparkle,
 on ledges and sills
 Of the rock, as it swerves, carries in it
 a wavering fire,
 Like a thought, like a joy, that no barrier
 stays from its flight,
 Or a dance of young children that carol
 their heart of delight;
 For it calls to the bud to burst open,
 the blade to thrust higher;
 To my heart, to my heart, it is calling
 ``O follow! for here
 Is thine own spirit, quick and enamoured
 of love and of light;
 O follow my swiftness and stay not
 in shadows of fear!``

 On beds in the valley, on sunny
 half--islanded banks,
 Where roots are athirst and refreshed
 and saplings grow bold
 Bowing their youth to the breezes
 in quivering ranks,
 Primroses, a cluster of softness
 and fragrance, unfold;
 And the fairy anemone, shaking
 her blossoms agleam--
 They are kisses of light as they tremble
 to touch and to part--
 Is flushed, ah! how faint, as with fire
 from the innermost heart
 Of a world in whose veins is a laughter
 as clear as the stream:
 And the music upholds me, enchants me,
 and borne like a wave,
 I am melted, I flow, I am nought
 but a hope and a dream,
 And in me is the youth of the flowers,
 and grief in her grave.

 Sudden a gust flings a shadow!
 and shivering, the black
 Driven leaves at the roots of the oak--tree
 are whirled up and lost
 Like the wild thoughts of fear into darkness,
 and strong boughs crack,
 And a gloom rushes down with a wailing,
 and out of it tossed
 Pale snow is outshaken, and hail
 drops icily keen
 On young leaf and dead; and awakened
 in tree--tops aloud
 Is the roar of the storm that has gathered
 the hills in a shroud
 Until naught of the towering rock
 but in glimmers is seen,
 A vision unfeatured, a phantom
 of terrible birth:--
 Is it thou that appearest, a presence
 divined in the cloud,
 Thy ribs and thy knees and thy breasts,
 O Titaness Earth?

 Is it thine, the great voice that confuses
 the winds and the floods
 In a meaningless cry as of madmen,
 a blindness of wrath,
 Smiting the bosses of oak
 and the virginal buds,
 Negligent where thou hast beaten
 thy desolate swath?
 O thou, who hast armed as for battle
 thy creatures wild
 With fierceness of claw and of fang,
 of hoof and of horn,
 From thee, even thee, from thy heart--beat
 was man, too, born
 With flesh like a flower defenceless?
 is he thy child?
 In whose eyes are wonder and trouble,
 who strikes, yet the wrong
 He has done he turns from again
 and with sorrow is torn:
 How shall his heart be as thine
 or in thy way strong?

 For who that is born of a woman
 has known not the hour
 When the spirit within him is daunted
 and this world comes
 As an army against him, a terror
 of alien power,
 And fate, too vast to be borne,
 his courage benumbs?
 Lost he seems as a child
 upon mountains alone.
 Who has longed not then with longing
 for a strength past pain
 To endure the rending of sorrow
 that makes hope vain,
 To be kneaded in iron and stubborned
 in armour of stone?
 That hour when the heavens are shaken
 within the mind,
 And the world is an enemy armed,
 have I not known?
 For the strength of the stony mountain
 have I not pined?

 But lo! on a sudden, with sighing
 the storm ends now
 In a radiant relenting: golden
 the light reappears
 With a glory of drops that are dancing
 on leaf and on bough;
 And a music, a wandering music
 returns to my ears.
 From the primrose is breathing a freshness,
 and wild, shy smells
 From the moss, where the snowflake is melted
 to dazzling dew,
 And the voice of the birds on the banks
 is uplifted anew
 To the carolling voice of the river
 that onward swells.
 Onward away, where the buds
 gleam white on the tree!
 The rain and the gloom are forgotten
 in heaven`s young blue;
 And my heart flows out with the river,
 the river with me.

 In a trance, in a trance I listen;
 and into my soul,
 As it draws far back to a stillness
 darkly stored
 With infinite sound gather
 and gradual roll
 The voices of all the torrents
 on earth outpoured.
 ``We tarry not, rest not, sleep not,``
 aloud they cry,
 ``We are swift as the hours that crumble
 thy strength into dust;
 We build thee no home, nor a fortress
 wherein to trust;
 But in us is the sound of dominion
 falling from high,
 And the kings of the world dethroned
 and towers laid bare.
 We move, we are ever beyond;
 we change, we die;
 We laugh, we live; to follow
 wilt thou, too, dare?``

 How shall I not go with you,
 O waters swift?
 Too long in yesterday`s self
 I tarry, and keep
 The dust of the world about me.
 Uplift, uplift,
 Lose me, a wave in the waves
 that laugh and leap!
 Lo, into uttermost time
 my thoughts I send:
 And because in my heart is a flowing
 no hour can bind,
 Because through the wrongs of the world
 looking forth and behind,
 I find for my thought not a close,
 for my soul not an end,
 With you will I follow, nor crave
 the strength of the strong
 Nor a fortress of time to enshield me
 from storms that rend.
 This is life, this is home, to be poured
 as a stream, as a song.
Source
The script ran 0.002 seconds.