The Convergence Of The Twain

 (Lines on the loss of the "Titanic")

 I
 In a solitude of the sea
 Deep from human vanity,
And the Pride of Life that planned her, stilly couches she.


 II

 Steel chambers, late the pyres
 Of her salamandrine fires,
Cold currents thrid, and turn to rhythmic tidal lyres.


 III

 Over the mirrors meant
 To glass the opulent
The sea-worm crawls--grotesque, slimed, dumb, indifferent.


 IV

 Jewels in joy designed
 To ravish the sensuous mind
Lie lightless, all their sparkles bleared and black and blind.


 V

 Dim moon-eyed fishes near
 Gaze at the gilded gear
And query: "What does this vaingloriousness down here?".
 .
 .


 VI

 Well: while was fashioning
 This creature of cleaving wing,
The Immanent Will that stirs and urges everything

 VII

 Prepared a sinister mate
 For her--so gaily great--
A Shape of Ice, for the time fat and dissociate.


 VIII

 And as the smart ship grew
 In stature, grace, and hue
In shadowy silent distance grew the Iceberg too.


 IX

 Alien they seemed to be:
 No mortal eye could see
The intimate welding of their later history.


 X

 Or sign that they were bent
 By paths coincident
On being anon twin halves of one August event,

 XI

 Till the Spinner of the Years
 Said "Now!" And each one hears,
And consummation comes, and jars two hemispheres.

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