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ULYSSES
Alfred Lord Tennyson (1809 - 1892)
Ever since I began this poem-a-week project, I have been surprised by the number of people who have told me that they either just plain don't like poetry, or have no interest in it. I am always polite when told this, of course, but what I want to say is, "You mean, except for Tennyson?"
I mean, how can anyone dislike, or not have an interest in Tennyson? I wonder, did this person never, as an adolescent, sit alone in a room, dark except for one small reading light, with legs pulled up close to the chest, filled with wonder while reading The Lady of Shalott?
. . . Heard a carol, mournful, holy,
Chanted loudly, chanted lowly -
Till her blood was frozen slowly,
And her eyes were darkened wholly,
Turned to the towered Chamolot;
For ere she reached, upon the tide,
The first house by the water-side,
Singing, in her song, she died -
The lady of Shalott . . .
I don't know if I ever actually read Tennyson all alone, wide-eyed, in a darkened room when I was a young, but I feel that I did whenever I read Tennyson today. It seems right somehow. And I can't help wondering whether the great God of "Progress" is being served well by the widespread substitution of video games and television for the reading of literature.
These are, of course, the thoughts of man who is acutely aware that he is growing older and getting increasingly grumpy about the changes he has witnessed in society. Which brings us to Tennyson's great poem Ulysses, always a favorite of mine, but never as meaningful to me as it is now as I approach what some fool once described as "the golden years."
In this classic poem, the great warrior has grown old. His epic battles and astonishing adventures are distant memories. His enemies are long dead. His devoted son, Telemachus, is ready to rule Ithaca. His brave and faithful wife, Penelope, is, in his words, "aged." His great ship sits in the harbor. His mariners, those "Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me,--," are ready, should he decide to sail off on one last adventure, which he desperately wants to do.
Old age hath yet his honor and his toil.
Death closes all; but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
Now I never "strove with Gods" as did the great Ulysses, but I know how he feels, and if you, gentle reader do not, you will some day, if you live long enough. In the meantime, enjoy your youth. And please enjoy to the following excerpt from Tennyson's great poem.
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Ulysses
It little profits that an idle king,
By this still hearth, among these barren crags,
Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race,
That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.
I cannot rest from travel; I will drink
Life to the lees. All times I have enjoy'd
Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with those
That loved me, and alone; on shore, and when
Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades
Vext the dim sea. I am become a name;
For always roaming with a hungry heart
Much have I seen and known,-- cities of men
And manners, climates, councils, governments,
Myself not least, but honor'd of them all,--
And drunk delight of battle with my peers,
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.
I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'
Gleams that untravell'd world whose margin fades
For ever and for ever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use!
As tho' to breathe were life! Life piled on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains; but every hour is saved
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,
And this gray spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.
This is my son, mine own Telemachus,
To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle,--
Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfill
This labor, by slow prudence to make mild
A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees
Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere
Of common duties, decent not to fail
In offices of tenderness, and pay
Meet adoration to my household gods,
When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.
There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail;
There gloom the dark, broad seas. My mariners,
Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me,--
That ever with a frolic welcome took
The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed
Free hearts, free foreheads,-- you and I are old;
Old age hath yet his honor and his toil.
Death closes all; but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks;
The long day wanes; the slow moon climbs; the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends.
'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down;
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are,--
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
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