Alfred, Lord Tennyson
The Lotos-Eaters
Courage! he said, and pointed toward the land, | ||
This mounting wave will roll us shoreward soon. | ||
In the afternoon they came unto a land, | ||
In which it seemed always afternoon. | ||
5 | All round the coast the languid air did swoon, | |
Breathing like one that hath a weary dream. | ||
Full-faced above the valley stood the moon; | ||
And like a downward smoke, the slender stream | ||
Along the cliff to fall and pause and fall did seem. | ||
10 | A land of streams! some, like a downward smoke, | |
Slow-dropping veils of thinnest lawn, did go; | ||
And some thro’ wavering lights and shadows broke, | ||
Rolling a slumbrous sheet of foam below. | ||
They saw the gleaming river seaward flow | ||
15 | From the inner land: far off, three mountain-tops, | |
Three silent pinnacles of aged snow, | ||
Stood sunset-flush’d: and, dew’d with showery drops, | ||
Up-clomb the shadowy pine above the woven copse. | ||
The charmed sunset linger’d low adown | ||
20 | In the red West: thro’ mountain clefts the dale | |
Was seen far inland, and the yellow down | ||
Border’d with palm, and many a winding vale | ||
And meadow, set with slender galingale; | ||
A land where all things always seem’d the same! | ||
25 | And round about the keel with faces pale, | |
Dark faces pale against that rosy flame, | ||
The mild-eyed melancholy Lotos-eaters came. | ||
Branches they bore of that enchanted stem, | ||
Laden with flower and fruit, whereof they gave | ||
30 | To each, but whoso did receive of them, | |
And taste, to him the gushing of the wave | ||
Far far away did seem to mourn and rave | ||
On alien shores; and if his fellow spake, | ||
His voice was thin, as voices from the grave; | ||
35 | And deep-asleep he seem’d, yet all awake, | |
And music in his ears his beating heart did make. | ||
They sat them down upon the yellow sand, | ||
Between the sun and moon upon the shore; | ||
And sweet it was to dream of Father-land, | ||
40 | Of child, and wife, and slave; but evermore | |
Most weary seem’d the sea, weary the oar, | ||
Weary the wandering fields of barren foam. | ||
Then some one said, We will return no more; | ||
And all at once they sang, Our island home | ||
45 | Is far beyond the wave; we will no longer roam. | |
CHORIC SONG | ||
1 | ||
There is sweet music here that softer falls | ||
Than petals from blown roses on the grass, | ||
Or night-dews on still waters between walls | ||
Of shadowy granite, in a gleaming pass; | ||
50 | Music that gentlier on the spirit lies, | |
Than tir’d eyelids upon tir’d eyes; | ||
Music that brings sweet sleep down from the blissful skies. | ||
Here are cool mosses deep, | ||
And thro’ the moss the ivies creep, | ||
55 | And in the stream the long-leaved flowers weep, | |
And from the craggy ledge the poppy hangs in sleep. | ||
2 | ||
Why are we weigh’d upon with heaviness, | ||
And utterly consumed with sharp distress, | ||
While all things else have rest from weariness? | ||
60 | 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 ever fold our wings, | ||
65 | 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? | ||
3 | ||
70 | Lo! in the middle of the wood, | |
The folded leaf is woo’d 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 | ||
75 | 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. | ||
80 | 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. | ||
4 | ||
Hateful is the dark-blue sky, | ||
85 | Vaulted o’er the dark-blue sea. | |
Death is the end of life; ah, why | ||
Should life all labour be? | ||
Let us alone. Time driveth onward fast, | ||
And in a little while our lips are dumb. | ||
90 | 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 | ||
95 | 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. | ||
5 | ||
How sweet it were, hearing the downward stream, | ||
100 | 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: | ||
105 | 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 melancholy; | ||
110 | To muse and brood and live again in memory, | |
With those old faces of our infancy | ||
Heap’d over with a mound of grass, | ||
Two handfuls of white dust, shut in an urn of brass! | ||
6 | ||
Dear is the memory of our wedded lives, | ||
115 | And dear the last embraces of our wives | |
And their warm tears: but all hath suffer’d change; | ||
For surely now our household hearths are cold: | ||
Our sons inherit us: our looks are strange: | ||
And we should come like ghosts to trouble joy. | ||
120 | Or else the island princes over-bold | |
Have eat our substance, and the minstrel sings | ||
Before them of the ten-years’ war in Troy, | ||
And our great deeds, as half-forgotten things. | ||
Is there confusion in the little isle? | ||
125 | Let what is broken so remain. | |
The Gods are hard to reconcile: | ||
‘Tis hard to settle order once again. | ||
There ‘is’ confusion worse than death, | ||
Trouble on trouble, pain on pain, | ||
130 | Long labour unto aged breath, | |
Sore task to hearts worn out with many wars | ||
And eyes grow dim with gazing on the pilot-stars. | ||
7 | ||
But, propt on beds of amaranth and moly, | ||
How sweet (while warm airs lull us, blowing lowly) | ||
135 | With half-dropt eyelids still, | |
Beneath a heaven dark and holy, | ||
To watch the long bright river drawing slowly | ||
His waters from the purple hill— | ||
To hear the dewy echoes calling | ||
140 | From cave to cave thro’ the thick-twined vine— | |
To watch [9] the emerald-colour’d water falling | ||
Thro’ many a wov’n acanthus-wreath divine! | ||
Only to hear and see the far-off sparkling brine, | ||
Only to hear were sweet, stretch’d out beneath the pine. | ||
8 | ||
145 | 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. | ||
150 | 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 reclined | ||
155 | 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, | ||
160 | 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; | ||
165 | Chanted from an ill-used 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, ’tis whisper’d—down in hell | ||
Suffer endless anguish, others in Elysian valleys dwell, | ||
170 | Resting weary limbs at last on beds of asphodel. | |
Surely, surely, slumber is more sweet than toil, the shore | ||
Than labour in the deep mid-ocean, wind and wave and oar; | ||
Oh rest ye, brother mariners, we will not wander more. |
First published 1833; revised 1842