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Alfred Tennyson
1809 - 1892

Tennyson is considered highly representative of the Victorian age in England. Poets of the late 19th and early 20th centuries who, rebelling against Victorian standards, denounced him for sentimentality, insipidity, intellectual shallowness, and narrow patriotism. I have put up a few of my favourite Tennyson poems: "Break, Break, Break," "The Lotos-eaters," "A River" and "Her Lover's Arm."

In the Valley of Cauteretz

All along the valley, stream that flashest white,
Deepening the voice with the deepening of the night,
All along the valley, where the waters flow,
I walked with one I loved two and thirty years ago.
All along the valley, while I walked today,
The two and thirty years were a mist that rolles away;
For all along the valley, down thy rocky bed,
Thy living voice to me was as the voice of the dead,
And all along the valley, by rock and cave and tree,
The voice of the dead was a living voice to me.

From sorrow sorrow yet is born,
Hopes flow like water through a sieve,
But leave not thou thy son forlorn;
Touch me, great Nature, make me live.
As when thy sunlights, a mild heat,
Touch some dun mere that sleepeth still;
As when thy moonlights, dim and sweet,
Touch some gray ruin on the hill.

Come not, when I am dead,

To drop thy foolish tears upon my grave,

To trample round my fallen head,

And vex the unhappy dust thou wouldst not save.

There let the wind sweep and the plover cry;

    But thou, go by.

Child, if it were thine error or thy crime

I care no longer, being all unblest:

Wed whom thou wilt, but I am sick of time,

And I desire to rest.

Pass on, weak heart, and leave me where I lie;

    Go by, go by.

Crossing the Bar

SUNSET and evening star,
   And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
   When I put out to sea,

But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
   Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
   Turns again home.

Twilight and evening bell,
   And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
   When I embark;

For tho’ from out our bourne of Time and Place
   The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
   When I have crost the bar.

© 2000 Elena and Yacov Feldman