ON the storm-cloven Cape The bitter waves roll With the bergs of the Pole,And the darks and the damps of the Northern Sea:
For the storm-cloven Cape Is an alien Shape With a fearful face;and it moans,and it stands Outside all lands Everlastingly!
When the fruits of the year Have been gathered in Spain;And the Indian rain Is rich on the evergreen lands of the Sun;
There comes to this Cape-
To this alien Shape,As the waters beat in and the echoes troop forth,The Wind of the North,Euroclydon!
And the wilted thyme,And the patches past Of the nettles cast In the drift of the rift,and the broken rime,Are tumbled and blown To every zone With the famished glede,and the plovers thinned By this fourfold Wind -This Wind sublime!
On the wrinkled hills By starts and fits The wild Moon sits;And the rindles fill,and flash,and fall In the way of her light,Through the straitened night,When the sea-heralds clamour,and elves of the war In the torrents afar,Hold festival!
From ridge to ridge The polar fires On the naked spires,With a foreign splendour,flit and flow;And clough and cave And architrave Have a blood-coloured glamour on roof and on wall,Like a nether hall In the hells below!
The dead dry lips Of the ledges,split By the thunder fit And the stress of the sprites of the fork flame,Anon break out With a shriek and a shout,Like a hard bitter laughter cracked and thin From a ghost with a sin Too dark for a name!
And all thro'the year,The fierce seas run From sun to sun,Across the face of a vacant world!
And the Wind flies forth From the wild white North,That shivers and harries the heart of things,And shapes with its wings A Chaos uphurled!
Like one who sees A rebel light In the thick of the night,As he stumbles and staggers on summits afar -Who looks to it still,Up hill and hill,With a steadfast hope (though the ways be deep,And rough,and steep),Like a steadfast star -So I,that stand On the outermost peaks Of peril,with cheeks Blue with the salts of a frosty sea,Have learnt to wait,With an eye elate And a heart intent,for the fuller blaze Of the Beauty that rays Like a glimpse for me -
Of the Beauty that grows Whenever I hear The Winds of Fear From the tops and the bases of barrenness call;And the duplicate lore Which I learn evermore,Is of Harmony filling and rounding the Storm,And the marvellous Form That governs all!
