Classic Poem

What instinct forces man to journey on,
— Urged by a longing blind but dominant!
— Nothing he sees can hold him, nothing daunt
His never failing eagerness. The sun
Setting in splendour every night has won
— His vassalage; those towers flamboyant
— Of airy cloudland palaces now haunt
His daylight wanderings. Forever done
With simple joys and quiet happiness
— He guards the vision of the sunset sky;
Though faint with weariness he must possess
— Some fragment of the sunset's majesty;
He spurns life's human friendships to profess
— Life's loneliness of dreaming ecstasy.