Here the flame that was ash, shrine that was void,
lost in the haunted wood,
I have tended and loved, year upon year, I in the solitude
Waiting, quiet and glad-eyed in the dark, knowing that once a gleam
Glowed and went through the wood. Still I abode strong in a golden dream,
Unrecaptured.
For I, I that had faith, knew that a face would glance
One day, white in the dim woods, and a voice call, and a radiance
Fill the grove, and the fire suddenly leap . . . and, in the heart of it,
End of labouring, you! Therefore I kept ready the altar, lit
The flame, burning apart.
Face of my dreams vainly in vision white
Gleaming down to me, lo! hopeless I rise now. For about midnight
Whispers grew through the wood suddenly, strange cries in the boughs above
Grated, cries like a laugh. Silent and black then through the sacred grove
Great birds flew, as a dream, troubling the leaves, passing at length.
I knew
Long expected and long loved, that afar, God of the dim wood, you
Somewhere lay, as a child sleeping, a child suddenly reft from mirth,
White and wonderful yet, white in your youth, stretched upon foreign earth,
God, immortal and dead!
Therefore I go; never to rest, or win
Peace, and worship of you more, and the dumb wood and the shrine therein.
(Rupert Brooke)
More Poetry from Rupert Brooke:
Rupert Brooke Poems based on Topics: God, Sleep, Laughter, War & Peace, Cry, Faces, Dreams, Youth, Immortality, Fire, Sleeping- Chilterns, The (Rupert Brooke Poems)
- Choriambics II (Rupert Brooke Poems)
- Call, The (Rupert Brooke Poems)
- Choriambics I (Rupert Brooke Poems)
- Beginning, The (Rupert Brooke Poems)
- A Memory (From A Sonnet- Sequence) (Rupert Brooke Poems)
Readers Who Like This Poem Also Like:
Based on Topics: God Poems, War & Peace Poems, Faces Poems, Youth Poems, Dreams Poems, Cry Poems, Fire Poems, Sleep Poems, Belief & Faith Poems, Laughter Poems, Imagination & Visualization PoemsBased on Keywords: hopeless, leap, altar, apart, wonderful, lit, grove, stretched, boughs, dumb, mirth