Classic Poem

Whence, and whither, and what are we,
Tossed on the billows of ceaseless strife?
Where is the shore beyond the sea?
Where is the fountain of human life?

Whence and whither? Ah, all in vain
We wait and listen. No tidings come;
Darkness and shadows still remain,
The stars are silent, the earth is dumb.

We question the years; they answer naught
Save this—from the void we also came.
The circle widens of human thought,
But life's horizon remains the same.

We pick with lenses the flecks of light,
We sift from Nebulæ sun by sun,
We mark and measure the comet's flight,
We weigh the planets one by one:

From lowest germ to highest form
We trace the links of Nature's chain;
But what is life—this essence warm?
The same deep mysteries still remain.

Like children who rap on an empty vault,
And listen to hollow echoes there,
Material science is still at fault—
The tomb of Nature is cold and bare.

Like travellers lost in forest vast,
Returning and crossing their paths again,
It reasons in circles, to find at last
That it reaches the point where the quest began.

Ah, fruitless search! We learn no more;
The wisest sage no knowledge brings;
No step returns from the silent shore;
“Rounded with sleep” the poet sings;

“A narrow cape betwixt two seas,”
“A swallow darting through the room,”
A leaf that flutters in the breeze,
A moment's light, a rayless tomb;

Phantasmagoria, thing of a day,
Born of the night, into darkness hurled,
Cunning compound of breath and clay,
Ashes and dust of a worn-out world:

Flitting shadows on cosmic screens!
Silhouettes thrown from a juggler's hand!
Phantom players in spectral scenes!
Is this the enigma to understand?

Or is there a breeze from the open sky
That wakens the harp of a thousand strings?
A firm-built hope that a human sigh
Is borne through ether on angels' wings?

An inspiration that One is just,
Who keeps the sparrow in His care?
That this spark from Him, in a shell of dust,
His love and goodness shall also share?

A final rest for faltering feet,
Weary and pierced with cruel wounds,
Climbing to reach the golden street
Up ladders made of brittle rounds?

Questions answered by Faith alone,
Not to be settled by words of strife;
To be learned at last, to be fully known,
When the key of death fits the wards of life.