Come to the window, sweet is the night-air! 
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched sand,
Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.

Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the Aegean, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery; we
Find also in the sound a thought,
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.

The sea of faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth’s shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled. 
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.

Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.

SELF-DEPENDENCE

Weary of myself, and sick of asking
What I am, and what I ought to be,
At this vessel’s prow I stand, which bears me
Forwards, forwards, o’er the starlit sea.

And a look of passionate desire
O’er the sea and to the stars I send: 
“Ye who from my childhood up have calmed me,
Calm me, ah, compose me to the end!

     “Ah, once more,” I cried, “ye stars, ye waters,
       On my heart your mighty charm renew;
     Still, still let me, as I gaze upon you,
       Feel my soul becoming vast like you.”

     From the intense, clear, star-sown vault of heaven,
       Over the lit sea’s unquiet way,
     In the rustling night-air came the answer:—­
       “Wouldst thou be as these are? Live as they.

     “Unaffrighted by the silence round them,
       Undistracted by the sights they see,
     These demand not that the things without them
       Yield them love, amusement, sympathy.

     “And with joy the stars perform their shining,
       And the sea its long moon-silvered roll;
     For self-poised they live, nor pine with noting
       All the fever of some differing soul.

     “Bounded by themselves, and unregardful
       In what state God’s other works may be,
     In their own tasks all their powers pouring,
       These attain the mighty life you see.”

     O air-born voice! long since, severely clear,
       A cry like thine in mine own heart I hear:—­
     “Resolve to be thyself; and know that he
       Who finds himself, loses his misery!”