by Isa Craig.
Originally published in The Argosy (Strahan & Co.) vol.1 #1 (Dec 1865).
Our thoughts are ships that go,
Blown by a breath, and with their fit words freighted,
All up and down the world; we never know,
When we have sent them forth, if they are fated
To find a haven, or to sink below
Oblivion's waters that about them flow;
Whether they'll come again, with riches weighted,
Having made merchandize
With other thoughts—exchange that duly rated
Each gives yet gains the prize—
Or running swift aground,
Be left amid the ooze to drift and flounder;
Or unseaworthy found
In the first stress of weather leak and founder.
Our thoughts are ships; some ply
A safe and simple trade in common things,
Creeping about the coasts of certainty,
And borne upon the tide that duly brings,
Sleeping and waking, needs, necessities:
This little coasting trade let none despise,
None may dispense with it, and so it should
Teach us the virtues of good neighbourhood,
And fetch and carry daily charities.
Some venture farther forth,
To realms remote, still for no doubtful gain:
From east to west, from south to utmost north,
To make man free of earth, his fair domain;
Such commerce one great nation makes of men,
The world their city, each a citizen.
Our thoughts are ships that track
The unknown—that ocean of immensity,
Watched by eternal stars—and few there be
That from the first horizon turn not back;
Yet some have bravely gone
Hoping new heavens and a new earth to find,
Like him who in his glorious dreams divined
Half of the world lay hid, and on and on
Held with the sunsets through the pathless seas,
And saw the land at length—such dreams as these
Conquer the kingdoms of realities.
The wonder-land of dreams!
Our thoughts are ships, the only ships, that sail
On its enchanted streams.
And when day's last light dims,
And the moon's hollow boat of silver pall
To westward dancing swims;
Or steers through white cloud billows,
Or through the shadowy willows,
In a magic light of the water's birth
That is neither of heaven, nor yet of earth,
A floating phantom gleams.
And the dream-boat glides and we glide with it,
And we seem to sit as one might sit
In the hollow of the moon reclining,
As it moves o'er the hills and the rivers shining.
And in that marvel land
Changed are all things, as by enchanter's wand;
Near are the heavenly things that were afar,
The things that were not are.
Far sweeter is its sadness—
And the winds there are woven out of sighs—
Than any earthly gladness,
The love there never dies—
And it is full of laughters,
And song floats on its airs,
And it hath no despairs,
But heavens of hereafters.
Our Argonauts are still
The seër, and the singer, and the sage;
Our Mopsus and our Idmon still engage—
Nature and Destiny interpreting—
To utter things to come, and have the skill
To know the speech of birds;
And wonder-working words
Still wound, and heal, and make alive, and kill;
The Healer still we take
For leader, he who from his stores can bring
Fresh draughts the spirit's fever thirst to slake;
Or can that essence make
Wisdom's elixir vitæ, yet distilled
By some rare souls, with life's true knowledge filled.
And though our Argosy
Moves not to music o'er a charmëd strand;
Nor golden fleece, on serpent-guarded tree,
Tempt us to visit famed or fabled land;
Nor silver-footed lady of the sea
Rises to help us in our straits, yet we
Launch forth in hope, in these despairing days
Launch bravely forth and hope new orphics yet to raise.