The Wanderer

A poem by Alan Seeger (1888-1916)

To see the clouds his spirit yearned toward so

Over new mountains piled and unploughed waves,

Back of old-storied spires and architraves

To watch Arcturus rise or Fomalhaut,

And roused by street-cries in strange tongues when day

Flooded with gold some domed metropolis,

Between new towers to waken and new bliss

Spread on his pillow in a wondrous way:

These were his joys. Oft under bulging crates,

Coming to market with his morning load,

The peasant found him early on his road

To greet the sunrise at the city-gates,—

There where the meadows waken in its rays,

Golden with mist, and the great roads commence,

And backward, where the chimney-tops are dense,

Cathedral-arches glimmer through the haze.

White dunes that breaking show a strip of sea,

A plowman and his team against the blue

Swiss pastures musical with cowbells, too,

And poplar-lined canals in Picardie,

And coast-towns where the vultures back and forth

Sail in the clear depths of the tropic sky,

And swallows in the sunset where they fly

Over gray Gothic cities in the north,

And the wine-cellar and the chorus there,

The dance-hall and a face among the crowd,—

Were all delights that made him sing aloud

For joy to sojourn in a world so fair.

Back of his footsteps as he journeyed fell

Range after range; ahead blue hills emerged.

Before him tireless to applaud it surged

The sweet interminable spectacle.

And like the west behind a sundown sea

Shone the past joys his memory retraced,

And bright as the blue east he always faced

Beckoned the loves and joys that were to be.

From every branch a blossom for his brow

He gathered, singing down Life’s flower-lined road,

And youth impelled his spirit as he strode

Like winged Victory on the galley’s prow.

That Loveliness whose being sun and star,

Green Earth and dawn and amber evening robe,

That lamp whereof the opalescent globe

The season’s emulative splendors are,

That veiled divinity whose beams transpire

From every pore of universal space,

As the fair soul illumes the lovely face—

That was his guest, his passion, his desire.

His heart the love of Beauty held as hides

One gem most pure a casket of pure gold.

It was too rich a lesser thing to bold;

It was not large enough for aught besides.

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Poems in English 

• The Story Of Our Lives by Mark Strand by Poetry In English
• The Self and the Mulberry by Marvin Bell by Poetry In English
• Your Poems on My Patio by Martina Reisz Newberry by Poetry In English
• The Room by Mark Strand by Poetry In English
• Yesterday’s Mishaps by Mary Etta Metcalf by Poetry In English
• The River Has Its Memories by Mary Etta Metcalf by Poetry In English
• Yes Dear by Mary Etta Metcalf by Poetry In English
• The River by Mark Olynyk by Poetry In English
• Words Unspoken by Mark Olynyk by Poetry In English
• The Remains by Mark Strand by Poetry In English
• Woman With Parasol by Martin Willitts Jr. by Poetry In English
• The Poetic Principle by Mark Olynyk by Poetry In English
• Why Write? by Mark Olynyk by Poetry In English
• The Other Side of Panic by Martina Reisz Newberry by Poetry In English
• Where Have We All Gone by Mary Etta Metcalf by Poetry In English
• The joyful things in life by Martin Smith by Poetry In English
• What is Poetry? by Mark Olynyk by Poetry In English
• The Frantic by Mark Miller by Poetry In English
• Wednesday by Marvin Bell by Poetry In English
• The End of the Argument by Martina Reisz Newberry by Poetry In English

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