"
"O Memory, where is now my love,
That rayed me as a god above?"
"I saw him by an ageing shape
Where beauty used to be;
That his fond phantom lingers there
Is only known to me."
[GREEK TITLE]
Long have I framed weak phantasies of Thee,
O Willer masked and dumb!
Who makest Life become, -
As though by labouring all-unknowingly,
Like one whom reveries numb.
How much of consciousness informs Thy will
Thy biddings, as if blind,
Of death-inducing kind,
Nought shows to us ephemeral ones who fill
But moments in Thy mind.
Perhaps Thy ancient rote-restricted ways
Thy ripening rule transcends;
That listless effort tends
To grow percipient with advance of days,
And with percipience mends.
For, in unwonted purlieus, far and nigh,
At whiles or short or long,
May be discerned a wrong
Dying as of self-slaughter; whereat I
Would raise my voice in song.
Footnotes:
{1} The "Race" is the turbulent sea-area off the Bill of Portland,
where contrary tides meet.
{2} Pronounce "Loddy."
{3} On a lonely table-land above the Vale of Blackmore, between
High-Stoy and Bubb-Down hills, and commanding in clear weather views
that extend from the English to the Bristol Channel, stands a pillar,
apparently mediaeval, called Cross-and-Hand or Christ-in-Hand.
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