Ulysses – Alfred Tennyson

Ulysses

ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON

It
little profits that an idle king,

By this
still hearth, among these barren crags,

Match'd
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 enjoy'd

Greatly,
have suffer'd greatly, both with those

That
loved me, and alone, on shore, and when

Thro'
scudding drifts the rainy Hyades

Vext
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 honour'd of them all;

And
drunk delight of battle with my peers,

Far on
the ringing plains of windy Troy.

I am a
part of all that I have met;

Yet all
experience is an arch wherethro'

Gleams
that untravell'd world whose margin fades

For
ever and forever when I move.

How
dull it is to pause, to make an end,

To rust
unburnish'd, not to shine in use!

As tho'
to breathe were life! Life piled on life

Were
all too 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 sceptre and the isle,—

Well-loved
of me, discerning to fulfil

This
labour, by slow prudence to make mild

A
rugged people, and thro' soft degrees

Subdue
them to the useful and the good.

Most
blameless is he, centred 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 toil'd, 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
hath 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,

'T is
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 stars, 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, whom we knew.

Tho'
much is taken, much abides; and tho'

We are
not now that strength which in 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.