Classic Poem

Happy all, who timely know
The bright gorge, that lies below
Trentishoe and Martinhoe.
Down the vale swift Parracombe
Brawls beneath soft alder gloom,
Toward a sea of sunlit sails,
Flashing far away to Wales:
Wales, a faery land afar,
Where sweet Celtic voices are;
Wales, where music rules the land.
Yet upon this hither strand
Burns a brilliant sun at noon,
Beams a gentle midnight moon:
Life upon each mighty slope
Fights at noon, with fire of hope;
Under the moon's dewy sky
Lives on dreaming memory.
And the embracing sea,
Sweet Earth! still brings peace to me,
In thy solitariness.
From the ends of thee there come,
Over every ocean, home,
Thoughts of each man's loneliness;
On the waves, down the strange wind.
Not one lone thought, but can find
Echo in some distant vale,
Where the deep gorge holds the gale:
Where the universal sun
Reigns, and moves the quiet moon:
Where one dreamer's hope hath won
Dreams at night of fair things done
In the spirit of strong noon.