| |
| NOT every thought can find its words, | |
| Not all within is known; | |
| For minds and hearts have many chords | |
| That never yield their tone. | |
| |
| Tastes, instincts, feelings, passions, powers, | 5 |
| Sleep there, unfelt, unseen; | |
| And other lives lie hid in ours— | |
| The lives that might have been; | |
| |
| Affections whose transforming force | |
| Could mould the heart anew; | 10 |
| Strong motives that might change the course | |
| Of all we think and do. | |
| |
| Upon the tall cliff’s cloud-wrapt verge | |
| The lonely shepherd stands, | |
| And hears the thundering ocean surge | 15 |
| That sweeps the far-off strands; | |
| |
| And thinks in peace of raging storms | |
| Where he will never be— | |
| Of life in all its unknown forms | |
| In lands beyond the sea. | 20 |
| |
| So in our dreams some glimpse appears, | |
| Though soon it fades again, | |
| How other lands or times or spheres | |
| Might make us other men; | |
| |
| How half our being lies in trance, | 25 |
| Nor joy nor sorrow brings, | |
| Unless the hand of circumstance | |
| Can touch the latent strings. | |
| |
| We know not fully what we are, | |
| Still less what we might be; | 30 |
| But hear faint voices from the far | |
| Dim lands beyond the sea. | |
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