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Selections from the poems of Arthur Hugh Clough
Selections from the poems of Arthur Hugh Clough Author:Arthur Hugh Clough Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: QUA CURSUM VENTUS As ships, becalmed at eve, that lay With canvas drooping, side by side, Two towers of sail at dawn of day Are scarce long leagues apa... more »rt descried ; When fell the night, upsprung the breeze, And all the darkling hours they plied, Nor dreamt but each the self-same seas By each was cleaving, side by side : E'en so—but why the tale reveal Of those, whom year by year unchanged, Brief absence joined anew to feel, Astounded, soul from soul estranged ? At dead of night their sails were filled, And onward each rejoicing steered— Ah, neither blame, for neither willed, Or wist,- what first with dawn appeared ! To veer, how vain ! On, onward strain, Brave barks ! In light, in darkness too, Through winds and tides one compass guides- To that, and your own selves, be true. But O blithe breeze ; and O great seas, ' Though ne'er, that earliest parting past, On your wide plain they join again, Together lead them home at last. One port, methought, alike they sought, One purpose hold where'er they fare,— O bounding breeze, O rushing seas ! At last, at last, unite them there ! - WEN GOTT BETRUGT, 1ST WOHL BETROGEN' Is it true, ye gods, who treat us As the gambling fool is treated ; O ye, who ever cheat us, And let us feel we're cheated ' Is it true that poetical power, The gift of heaven, the dower Of Apollo and the Nine, The inborn sense, ' the vision and the faculty divine,' All we glorify and bless In our rapturous exaltation, All invention, and creation, Exuberance of fancy, and sublime imagination, All a poet's fame is built on, The fame of Shakespeare, Milton, Of Wordsworth, Byron, Shelley, Is in reason's grave precision, Nothing more, nothing less, Than a peculiar conformation, Constit...« less