Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). A Victorian Anthology, 1837–1895. 1895.

Frederic William Henry Myers 1843–1901

Immortality

Myers-Fr

SO when the old delight is born anew,

And God reanimates the early bliss,

Seems it not all as one first trembling kiss

Ere soul knew soul with whom she has to do?

O nights how desolate, O days how few,

O death in life, if life be this, be this!

O weigh’d alone as one shall win or miss

The faint eternity which shines therethro’!

Lo, all that age is as a speck of sand

Lost on the long beach where the tides are free,

And no man metes it in his hollow hand

Nor cares to ponder it, how small it be;

At ebb it lies forgotten on the land

And at full tide forgotten in the sea.