“Shadows and shoals that edge eternity,”
and through
... “that last
Wild pageant of the accumulated past
That clangs and flashes for a drowning man.”
The superb climax just quoted terminates one of the most vivid and haunting of the “House of Life” series,—“The Soul’s Sphere,”—illustrative of the vast range of consciousness known to one
“Who, sleepless, hath ... anguished to appease
Tragical shadow’s realm of sound and sight
Conjectured in the lamentable night,”
and probes the memory for images whose calm splendour may bring forgetfulness of self. The subject is that of Wordsworth’s well-known sonnet, “A flock of sheep that leisurely pass by;” and the contrast between the visions conjured up by the two very diverse poets exactly illustrates the difference of temperament which set them at opposite poetic poles. The mind of Wordsworth rests in the contemplation of familiar things, gains peace in the common incidents of pastoral life, loves Nature best in her ordinary moods, and seeks always the homeliest of consolations, the most universal joys. The mind of Rossetti craves ever for the superlative, the exceptional, the intense, and can find no ease in anything very simple and quiet.