6416
Ulysses
dagothagahnim
It little profits that an idle king, ::by this still hearth, among these barren crags, ::matches with an aged wife, I mete and dole ::unequal laws unto a savage race, ::that hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me. :: ::I cannot rest from travel: I will drink ::life to the lees: All times I have enjoyed ::greatly, have suffered greatly, both with those ::that loved me, and alone; on shore, and when ::through scudding drifts the rainy Hyades ::vest 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, governments, ::myself not least, but honoured of them all; ::and drunk delight of battle with my peers; ::far on the ringing plains of windy Troy. ::I am part of all that I have met; ::yet all experience is an arch wherethrough ::gleams that untravelled world, whose margin fades ::for ever and for ever when I move. ::How dull it is to pause, to make an end, ::to rust unburnished, not to shine in use! ::As though to breath were life, life piled on life. ::Were all to little, and of one to me ::little remains: But every hour is saved ::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 scepter and the isle ::well-loved of me, discerning to fulfill ::this labour, by slow prudence to make mild ::a rugged people, and through soft degrees ::subdue them to the useful and the good. ::Most blameless is he, centered 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 mine. :: ::There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail: ::there gloom the dark broad seas. My mariners, ::souls that have toiled, and ::wrought, and thought with me ::that ever with a frolic welcome took ::the thunder and the sunshine, and opposed ::free hearts, free foreheads you and I are old; ::old age had yet his honour 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, ::'tis 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 starts, 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, whome we knew. ::Though much is taken, much abides. :: ::And though we are not now that strength, ::which in the old days moved 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.