Ulysses (II)

Listen to:

Ulysses (II) (1:50)

by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

performed by Bob Gonzalez, rhapsode

There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail:

    There gloom the dark broad seas. My mariners,

    Souls that have toiled, 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 honour 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

    Though much is taken, much abides; and though

    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.

Hyades - a constellation of stars associated with rain

The Happy Isles -  the Elysian Fields, believed by some to be the resting place of heroes after death;