"Ere we Gomera cleared, a coward cried,
`Turn, turn: here be three caravels ahead,
From Portugal, to take us: we are dead!
`Turn, turn: here be three caravels ahead,
From Portugal, to take us: we are dead!
Sidney Lanier
--
Big perilous theorem, hard for king and priest:
`Pursue the West but long enough, 'tis East! '
Oh, if this watery world no turning take!
Oh, if for all my logic, all my dreams,
Provings of that which is by that which seems,
Fears, hopes, chills, heats, hastes, patiences, droughts, tears,
Wife-grievings, slights on love, embezzled years,
Hates, treaties, scorns, upliftings, loss and gain, --
This earth, no sphere, be all one sickening plane!
III.
"Or, haply, how if this contrarious West,
That me by turns hath starved, by turns hath fed,
Embraced, disgraced, beat back, solicited,
Have no fixed heart of Law within his breast,
Or with some different rhythm doth e'er contest
Nature in the East? Why, 'tis but three weeks fled
I saw my Judas needle shake his head
And flout the Pole that, east, he Lord confessed!
God! if this West should own some other Pole,
And with his tangled ways perplex my soul
Until the maze grow mortal, and I die
Where distraught Nature clean hath gone astray,
On earth some other wit than Time's at play,
Some other God than mine above the sky!
IV.
"Now speaks mine other heart with cheerier seeming:
`Ho, Admiral! o'er-defalking to thy crew
Against thyself, thyself far overfew
To front yon multitudes of rebel scheming? '
Come, ye wild twenty years of heavenly dreaming!
Come, ye wild weeks since first this canvas drew
Out of vexed Palos ere the dawn was blue,
O'er milky waves about the bows full-creaming!
Come set me round with many faithful spears
Of confident remembrance -- how I crushed
Cat-lived rebellions, pitfalled treasons, hushed
Scared husbands' heart-break cries on distant wives,
Made cowards blush at whining for their lives,
Watered my parching souls, and dried their tears.
V.
"Ere we Gomera cleared, a coward cried,
`Turn, turn: here be three caravels ahead,
From Portugal, to take us: we are dead! '
`Hold Westward, pilot,' calmly I replied.
So when the last land down the horizon died,
`Go back, go back! ' they prayed: `our hearts are lead. ' --
`Friends, we are bound into the West,' I said.
Then passed the wreck of a mast upon our side.
`See' (so they wept) `God's Warning! Admiral, turn! ' --
`Steersman,' I said, `hold straight into the West. '
Then down the night we saw the meteor burn.
`So do the very heavens in fire protest:
Good Admiral, put about! O Spain, dear Spain! ' --
`Hold straight into the West,' I said again.
VI.
"Next drive we o'er the slimy-weeded sea.
`Lo!
Big perilous theorem, hard for king and priest:
`Pursue the West but long enough, 'tis East! '
Oh, if this watery world no turning take!
Oh, if for all my logic, all my dreams,
Provings of that which is by that which seems,
Fears, hopes, chills, heats, hastes, patiences, droughts, tears,
Wife-grievings, slights on love, embezzled years,
Hates, treaties, scorns, upliftings, loss and gain, --
This earth, no sphere, be all one sickening plane!
III.
"Or, haply, how if this contrarious West,
That me by turns hath starved, by turns hath fed,
Embraced, disgraced, beat back, solicited,
Have no fixed heart of Law within his breast,
Or with some different rhythm doth e'er contest
Nature in the East? Why, 'tis but three weeks fled
I saw my Judas needle shake his head
And flout the Pole that, east, he Lord confessed!
God! if this West should own some other Pole,
And with his tangled ways perplex my soul
Until the maze grow mortal, and I die
Where distraught Nature clean hath gone astray,
On earth some other wit than Time's at play,
Some other God than mine above the sky!
IV.
"Now speaks mine other heart with cheerier seeming:
`Ho, Admiral! o'er-defalking to thy crew
Against thyself, thyself far overfew
To front yon multitudes of rebel scheming? '
Come, ye wild twenty years of heavenly dreaming!
Come, ye wild weeks since first this canvas drew
Out of vexed Palos ere the dawn was blue,
O'er milky waves about the bows full-creaming!
Come set me round with many faithful spears
Of confident remembrance -- how I crushed
Cat-lived rebellions, pitfalled treasons, hushed
Scared husbands' heart-break cries on distant wives,
Made cowards blush at whining for their lives,
Watered my parching souls, and dried their tears.
V.
"Ere we Gomera cleared, a coward cried,
`Turn, turn: here be three caravels ahead,
From Portugal, to take us: we are dead! '
`Hold Westward, pilot,' calmly I replied.
So when the last land down the horizon died,
`Go back, go back! ' they prayed: `our hearts are lead. ' --
`Friends, we are bound into the West,' I said.
Then passed the wreck of a mast upon our side.
`See' (so they wept) `God's Warning! Admiral, turn! ' --
`Steersman,' I said, `hold straight into the West. '
Then down the night we saw the meteor burn.
`So do the very heavens in fire protest:
Good Admiral, put about! O Spain, dear Spain! ' --
`Hold straight into the West,' I said again.
VI.
"Next drive we o'er the slimy-weeded sea.
`Lo!
