The Poet's Simple Faith

 You say, "Where goest thou?" I cannot tell, 
 And still go on. If but the way be straight, 
 It cannot go amiss! before me lies 
 Dawn and the Day; the Night behind me; that 
 Suffices me; I break the bounds; I see, 
 And nothing more; believe, and nothing less. 
 My future is not one of my concerns. 
 
 PROF. E. DOWDEN. 


 I AM CONTENT. 
 
 ("J'habite l'ombre.") 
 
 {1855.} 


 True; I dwell lone, 
 Upon sea-beaten cape, 
 Mere raft of stone; 
 Whence all escape 
 Save one who shrinks not from the gloom, 
 And will not take the coward's leap i' the tomb. 
 
 My bedroom rocks 
 With breezes; quakes in storms, 
 When dangling locks 
 Of seaweed mock the forms 
 Of straggling clouds that trail o'erhead 
 Like tresses from disrupted coffin-lead. 
 
 Upon the sky 
 Crape palls are often nailed 
 With stars. Mine eye 
 Has scared the gull that sailed 
 To blacker depths with shrillest scream, 
 Still fainter, till like voices in a dream. 
 
 My days become 
 More plaintive, wan, and pale, 
 While o'er the foam 
 I see, borne by the gale, 
 Infinity! in kindness sent— 
 To find me ever saying: "I'm content!" 


 

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