Thomas Humphry Ward, ed. The English Poets. 1880–1918.rnVol. V. Browning to Rupert Brooke
Frederic William Henry Myers (18431901)From Saint Paul
O
Soul that would stay it in the straiter scope.
Oft shall the chill day and the even dreary
Force on my heart the frenzy of a hope:—
Strains for the harbour where her sails are furled;—
Lo, as some innocent and eager maiden
Leans o’er the wistful limit of the world,
Wonderful wooing and the grace of tears,
Dreams with what eyes and what a sweet insistence
Lovers are waiting in the hidden years;—
Promise and presage of sublime emprise,
Wears evermore the seal of his believing
Deep in the dark of solitary eyes;
Fashions his fancies of the realm to be,
Fallen from the height or from the deeps arisen,
Ringed with the rocks and sundered of the sea;—
So even I, and with a hope more sweet,
Yearn for the sign, O Christ! of thy fulfilling,
Faint for the flaming of thine advent feet.