A Hidden Life and Other Poems by George MacDonald (best books to read in your 20s txt) 📖

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I.

Upon a rock, high on a mountain side,
Thousands of feet above the lake-sea's lip,
A rock in which old waters' rise and dip,
Plunge and recoil, and backward eddying tide
Had, age-long, worn, while races lived and died,
Involved channels, where the sea-weed's drip
Followed the ebb; and now earth-grasses sip
Fresh dews from heaven, whereby on earth they bide-
I sat and gazed southwards. A dry flow
Of withering wind blew on my drooping strength
From o'er the awful desert's burning length.
Behind me piled, away and upward go
Great sweeps of savage mountains-up, away,
Where panthers roam, and snow gleams all the day.


II.

Ah, God! the world needs many hours to make;
Nor hast thou ceased the making of it yet,
But wilt be working on when Death hath set
A new mound in some churchyard for my sake.
On flow the centuries without a break.
Uprise the mountains, ages without let.
The mosses suck the rock's breast, rarely wet.
Years more than past, the young earth yet will take.
But in the dumbness of the rolling time,
No veil of silence will encompass me-
Thou wilt not once forget, and let me be:
I easier think that thou, as I my rhyme,
Wouldst rise, and with a tenderness sublime
Unfold a world, that I, thy child, might see.


A GIFT.


My gift would find thee fast asleep,
And arise a dream in thee;
A violet sky o'er the roll and sweep
Of a purple and pallid sea;
And a crescent moon from my sky should creep
In the golden dream to thee.

Thou shouldst lay thee down, and sadly list
To the wail of our cold birth-time;
And build thee a temple, glory-kissed,
In the heart of the sunny clime;
Its columns should rise in a music-mist,
And its roofs in a spirit-rhyme.

Its pillars the solemn hills should bind
'Neath arches of starry deeps;
Its floor the earth all veined and lined;
Its organ the ocean-sweeps;
And, swung in the hands of the grey-robed wind,
Its censers the blossom-heaps.

And 'tis almost done; for in this my rhyme,
Thanks to thy mirror-soul,
Thou wilt see the mountains, and hear the chime
Of the waters after the roll;
And the stars of my sky thy sky will climb,
And with heaven roof in the whole.


THE MAN OF SONGS.


"Thou wanderest in the land of dreams,
O man of many songs;
To thee the actual only seems-
No realm to thee belongs."

"Seest thou those mountains in the east,
O man of ready aim?"
"'T is only vapours that thou seest,
In mountain form and name."

"Nay, nay, I know them all too well,
Each ridge, and peak, and dome;
In that cloud-land, in one high dell,
Nesteth my little home."


BETTER THINGS.


Better to smell a violet,
Than sip the careless wine;
Better to list one music tone,
Than watch the jewels' shine.

Better to have the love of one,
Than smiles like morning dew;
Better to have a living seed
Than flowers of every hue.

Better to feel a love within,
Than be lovely to the sight;
Better a homely tenderness
Than beauty's wild delight.

Better to love than be beloved.
Though lonely all the day;
Better the fountain in the heart,
Than the fountain by the way.

Better a feeble love to God,
Than for woman's love to pine;
Better to have the making God
Than the woman made divine.

Better be fed by mother's hand,
Than eat alone at will;
Better to trust in God, than say:
My goods my storehouse fill.

Better to be a little wise
Than learned overmuch;
Better than high are lowly thoughts,
For truthful thoughts are such.

Better than thrill a listening crowd,
Sit at a wise man's feet;
But better teach a child, than toil
To make thyself complete.

Better to walk the realm unseen,
Than watch the hour's event;
Better the smile of God alway,
Than the voice of men's consent.

Better to have a quiet grief
Than a tumultuous joy;
Better than manhood, age's face,
If the heart be of a boy.

Better the thanks of one dear heart,
Than a nation's voice of praise;
Better the twilight ere the dawn,
Than yesterday's mid-blaze.

Better a death when work is done,
Than earth's most favoured birth;
Better a child in God's great house
Than the king of all the earth.


THE JOURNEY.


Hark, the rain is on my roof!
Every sound drops through the dark
On my soul with dull reproof,
Like a half-extinguished spark.
I! alas, how am I here,
In the midnight and alone?
Caught within a net of fear!
All my dreams of beauty gone!

I will rise: I must go forth.
Better face the hideous night,
Better dare the unseen north,
Than be still without the light!
Black wind rushing round my brow,
Sown with stinging points of rain!
Place or time I know not now-
I am here, and so is pain!

I will leave the sleeping street,
Hie me forth on darker roads.
Ah! I cannot stay my feet,
Onward, onward, something goads.
I will take the mountain path,
Beard the storm within its den,
Know the worst of this dim wrath,
Vexing thus the souls of men.

Chasm 'neath chasm! rock piled on rock:
Roots, and crumbling earth, and stones!
Hark, the torrent's thundering shock!
Hark, the swaying pine tree's groans!
Ah, I faint, I fall, I die!
Sink to nothingness away!-
Lo, a streak upon the sky!
Lo, the opening eye of day!


II.

Mountain heights that lift their snows
O'er a valley green and low;
And a winding path, that goes
Guided by the river's flow;
And a music rising ever,
As of peace and low content,
From the pebble-paven river
As an odour upward sent.

And a sighing of the storm
Far away amid the hills,
Like the humming of a swarm
That the summer forest fills;
And a frequent fall of rain
From a cloud with ragged weft;
And a burst of wind amain
From the mountain's sudden cleft.

Then a night that hath a moon,
Staining all the cloudy white;
Sinking with a soundless tune
Deep into the spirit's night.
Then a morning clear and soft,
Amber on the purple hills;
Warm high day of summer, oft
Cooled by wandering windy rills.

Joy to travel thus along,
With the universe around!
I the centre of the throng;
Every sight and every sound
Speeding with its burden laden,
Speeding homewards to my soul!
Mine the eye the stars are made in!
I the heart of all this whole!


III.

Hills retreat on either hand,
Sinking down into the plain;
Slowly through the level land
Glides the river to the main.
What is that before me, white,
Gleaming through the dusky air?
Dimmer in the gathering night;
Still beheld, I know not where?

Is it but a chalky ridge,
Bared by many a trodden mark?
Or a river-spanning bridge,
Miles away into the dark?
Or the foremost leaping waves
Of the everlasting sea,
Where the Undivided laves
Time with its eternity?

No, tis but an eye-made sight,
In my brain a fancied gleam;
Or a thousand things as white,
Set in darkness, well might seem.
There it wavers, shines, is gone;
What it is I cannot tell;
When the morning star hath shone,
I shall see and know it well.

Onward, onward through the night!
Matters it I cannot see?
I am moving in a might,
Dwelling in the dark and me.
Up or down, or here or there,
I can never be alone;
My own being tells me where
God is as the Father known.


IV.

Joy! O joy! the Eastern sea
Answers to the Eastern sky;
Wide and featured gloriously
With swift billows bursting high.
Nearer, nearer, oh! the sheen
On a thousand waves at once!
Oh! the changing crowding green!
Oh my beating heart's response!

Down rejoicing to the strand,
Where the sea-waves shore-ward lean,
Curve their graceful heads, and stand
Gleaming with ethereal green,
Then in foam fall heavily-
This is what I saw at night!
Lo, a boat! I'll forth on thee,
Dancing-floor for my delight.

From the bay, wind-winged, we glance;
Sea-winds seize me by the hair!
What a terrible expanse!
How the ocean tumbles there!
I am helpless here afloat,
For the wild waves know not me;
Gladly would I change my boat
For the snow wings of the sea!

Look below. Each watery whirl
Cast in beauty's living mould!
Look above! Each feathery curl
Faintly tinged with morning gold!-
Oh, I tremble with the gush
Of an everlasting youth!
Love and fear together rush:
I am free in God, the Truth!


PRAYER.


We doubt the word that tells us: Ask,
And ye shall have your prayer;
We turn our thoughts as to a task,
With will constrained and rare.

And yet we have; these scanty prayers
Yield gold without alloy:
O God! but he that trusts and dares
Must have a boundless joy.


REST.


When round the earth the Father's hands
Have gently drawn the dark;
Sent off the sun to fresher lands,
And curtained in the lark;
'Tis sweet, all tired with glowing day,
To fade with faded light;
To lie once more, the old weary way,
Upfolded in the night.

A mother o'er the couch may bend,
And rose-leaf kisses heap:
In soothing dreams with sleep they blend,
Till even in dreams we sleep.
And, if we wake while night is dumb,
'Tis sweet to turn and say,
It is an hour ere dawning come,
And I will sleep till day.


II.

There is a dearer, warmer bed,
Where one all day may lie,
Earth's bosom pillowing the head,
And let the world go by.
Instead of mother's love-lit eyes,
The church's storied pane,
All blank beneath cold starry skies,
Or sounding in the rain.

The great world, shouting, forward fares:
This chamber, hid from none,
Hides safe from all, for no one cares
For those whose work is done.
Cheer thee, my heart, though tired and slow
An unknown grassy place
Somewhere on earth is waiting now
To rest thee from thy race.


III.

There is a calmer than all calms,
A quiet more deep than death:
A folding in the Father's palms,
A breathing in his breath;
A rest made deeper by alarms
And stormy sounds combined:
The child within its mother's arms
Sleeps sounder for the wind.

There needs no curtained bed to hide
The world with all its wars,
Nor grassy cover to divide
From sun and moon and stars
A window open to the skies,
A sense of changeless life,
With oft returning still surprise
Repels the sounds of strife.


IV.

As one bestrides a wild scared horse
Beneath a