# Poems (Tennyson, 1843)/Volume 1/Ode to Memory

ODE TO MEMORY.
i.
From the fountains of the past, To glorify the present; oh, haste, Visit my low desire! Strengthen me, enlighten me! I faint in this obscurity, Thou dewy dawn of memory.
ii.
Flinging the gloom of yesternight On the white day; but robed in soften'd light Of orient state.
Whilome thou earnest with the morning mist, Even as a maid, whose stately brow The dew-impearled winds of dawn have kiss'd, When she, as thou, Stays on her floating locks the lovely freight Of overflowing blooms, and earliest shoots Of orient green, giving safe pledge of fruits, Which in wintertide shall star The black earth with brilliance rare.
iii.
And with the evening cloud, Showering thy gleaned wealth into my open breast. (Those peerless flowers which in the rudest wind Never grow sere, When rooted in the garden of the mind. Because they are the earliest of the year). Nor was the night thy shroud. In sweet dreams softer than unbroken rest Thou leddest by the hand thine infant Hope.
The eddying of her garments caught from thee The light of thy great presence; and the cope Of the half-attain'd futurity, Though deep not fathomless, Was cloven with the million stars which tremble O'er the deep mind of dauntless infancy. Small thought was there of life's distress; For sure she deem'd no mist of earth could dull Those spirit-thrilling eyes so keen and beautiful: Sure she was nigher to heaven's spheres, Listening the lordly music flowing from The illimitable years. Oh strengthen me, enlighten me! I faint in this obscurity, Thou dewy dawn of memory.
iv.
Thou of the many tongues, the myriad eyes! Thou comest not with shows of flaunting vines Unto mine inner eye, Divinest memory!
Thou wert not nursed by the waterfall Which ever sounds and shines A pillar of white light upon the wall Of purple cliffs, aloof descried: Come from the woods that belt the gray hill-side, The seven elms, the poplars four That stand beside my father's door, And chiefly from the brook that loves To purl o'er matted cress and ribbed sand, Or dimple in the dark of rushy coves, Drawing into his narrow earthen urn, In every elbow and turn, The filter'd tribute of the rough woodland. I hither lead thy feet! Pour round mine oars the livelong bleat Of the thick-fleeced sheep from wattled folds, Upon the ridged wolds, When the first matin-song hath waken'd loud Over the dark dewy earth forlorn, What time the amber morn Forth gushes from beneath a low-hung cloud.
v.
To the young spirit present When first she is wed; And like a bride of old In triumph led, With music and sweet showers Of festal flowers, Unto the dwelling she must sway. Well hast thou done, great artist Memory, In setting round thy first experiment With royal frame-work of wrought gold; Needs must thou dearly love thy first essay, And foremost in thy various gallery Place it, where sweetest sunlight falls Upon the storied walls; For the discovery And newness of thine art so pleased thee, That all which thou hast drawn of fairest Or boldest since, but lightly weighs With thee unto the love thou bearest The first-born of thy genius. Artist-like,
Ever retiring thou dost gaze On the prime labour of thine early days: No matter what the sketch might be; Whether the high field on the bushless Pike, Or even a sand-built ridge Of heaped hills that mound the sea, Overblown with murmurs harsh, Or even a lowly cottage whence we see Stretch'd wide and wild the waste enormous marsh. Where from the frequent bridge, Like emblems of infinity, The trenched waters run from sky to sky; Or a garden bower'd close With plaited alleys of the trailing rose, Long alleys falling down to twilight grots, Or opening upon level plots Of crowned lilies, standing near Purple-spiked lavender: Whither in after life retired From brawling storms, From weary wind, With youthful fancy reinspired.
We may hold converse with all forms Of the many-sided mind, And those whom passion hath not blinded, Subtle-thoughted, myriad-minded. My friend, with you to live alone, Methinks were better than to own A crown, a sceptre, and a throne. O strengthen me, enlighten me! I faint in this obscurity, Thou dewy dawn of memory.