Across the Sea and Other Poems.

by Thomas S. Chard

THE ANSWER.

I may escape, for others have before,
Why should I fear to view the storm-cloud's form?
I answered to the Voice. In One I trust,
Upon whose blazing path the clouds are dust,
Why should I cower 'neath the whirlwind's roar?
God's chariot is the whirlwind and the storm.

The thunder of the deep will be my psalm,
And e'en the crested wave, that totters o'er
My way, will seem an emerald arbor fair,
With portals of bluebells and lilies rare;
For Fancy knoweth not of storm or calm,
It dreameth but of beauty evermore.

THE VOICE.

Yet 'tis a weary way, the Voice replied,
A trackless way of danger and of care;
And from thy cheek, ere tho the Headland find,
The rose will yield its petals to the wind;
And from thy heart an adverse cruel tide
Will steal the dream of hope, and leave—despair.

Consider too, O youth, Earth is a sphere,
And he who journeys to the verge of age,
But comes at eve to where he left at morn,
But views at last the hearth where he was born,
But learns, the bright horizon ne'er draws near
The circle climbers of life's pilgrimage.

Think well, again, thou mayst forever part
From pleasure, seeking pleasure o'er the main.
The good of life—such is the human lot—
Seems only good to those who have it not.
Joy, smiling, opes the portals of the heart.
But when he enters, Lo! his name is Pain.

Nothing but rest can satisfy thy thirst
For happiness. Hast thou on land or sea
Found what was not a weariness at last,
And shall to-morrow cheat thee as the past?
The glowing bubbles of the future burst,
Touched by the finger-tip of Memory.

Thou art a poet, yet perchance may find
The birds will carol more delicious lays;
Thy waves of song may melt in melody,
Yet softer is the music of the sea.
Thou canst not rhyme so sweetly as the wind,
And nature is too subtile for thy phrase.

But leaning on the muffled harp of thought,
Here sweet for thee will sigh the summer wind,
And dreamful will the rhythm of the deep
Upon the shore of silver fall asleep.
Nor wilt thou miss what thou has never sought,
Nor seek what men at last have failed to find.