O'er the sea-ramparts where I lie,
Built up of chalk sea-pressed and knit
By the close turf-roots covering it,
Swift lights and shadows chase and fly,
Moths flit, birds travel; all but they
Seems passing and to pass away.
Matched with the shifting sea's green waves,
How steadfast these! And secular signs
Are on them, deep-entrenched lines
Of Roman tracks, and mounded graves
Of Britain; yet we know their birth
Late in the chronicle of earth.
Shell-fragments in yon flinty case.
This channelled slope wherein I rest—
Curved softly, like a woman's breast—
That crumbling ledge, that sea-worn base,
To insight have revealed the power
Which made these walls and doth devour.
Fade we not also? Ah! too plain
Those graves proclaim it, and too sure
He feels it who hath seen Death's door
Half-opened, nor can taste again
That draught of happiness which erst
Life stretched to his unconscious thirst.
But who is oracle for Death?
By whose clear witness are we taught
The spirit that hath loved and thought
Dies with the body's failing breath?—
The same false eye of sense which told
How steadfast were the hills and old.
Insight once more refutes the tale;
Kindled by Love, the spirit's gaze,
Focussing all Hope's astral rays,
Can pierce mortality's dull veil,
And picture in the cosmic span
A happier sphere than earth for man.
Unproved, unprovable the creed,
Bridging a gulf which baffles yet
Brain to explore or heart forget;
But grounded in our common need,
It trusts His purpose to fulfil,
Love's yearning who did first instil.
Moved by dim dreams to reach His eye,
Mutely appealed our fathers rude
When on this upland solitude
They placed their dead so near the sky;
And we who love and lose to-day
Are haply finer-souled than they.
O gentle, kindly hills! not less,
But more we prize you, that we hold
Ourselves, albeit we seem not old,
And wear no mask of steadfastness,
Heirs of a life that will not pass
With crumbling chalk and withering grass.
Prize we or scorn, ye still will bless;
Your outlines load the eye with wealth,
Your sweet airs charm the sick to health,
Your calm rebukes our carefulness,
Your very lifelessness doth give
Zest to the knowledge that we live.