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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE WANDERER: 5. IN HOLLAND: ON MY TWENTY-FOURTH YEAR by EDWARD ROBERT BULWER-LYTTON

Poet Analysis

First Line: THE NIGHT'S IN NOVEMBER: THE WINDS ARE AT STRIFE
Last Line: TO MY TWENTY-FOURTH YEAR.
Subject(s): BIRTHDAYS; NETHERLANDS; TRAVEL; HOLLAND; DUTCH PEOPLE; JOURNEYS; TRIPS;
THE night 's in November: the winds are at strife:
The snow 's on the hill, and the ice on the mere:
The world to its winter is turned: and my life
To its twenty-fourth year.

The swallows are flown to the south long ago:
The roses are fallen: the woodland is sere.
Hope 's flown with the swallows: Love's rose will not grow
In my twenty-fourth year.

The snow on the threshold: the cold at the heart:
But the fagot to warm, and the winecup to cheer:
God's help to look up to: and courage to start
On my twenty-fourth year.

And 't is well that the month of the roses is o'er!
The last, which I plucked for Neraea to wear,
She gave her new lover. A man should do more
With his twenty-fourth year

Than mourn for a woman, because she's unkind,
Or pine for a woman, because she is fair.
Ah, I loved you, Neraea! But now...never mind,
'T is my twenty-fourth year!

What a thing! to have done with the follies of Youth,
Ere Age brings ITS follies! ...though many a tear
It should cost, to see Love fly away, and find Truth
In one's twenty-fourth year.

The Past's golden valleys are drained. I must plant
On the Future's rough upland new harvests, I fear.
Ho, the plough and the team! ...who would perish of want
In his twenty-fourth year?

Man's heart is a well, which forever renews
The void at the bottom, no sounding comes near:
And Love does not die, though its object I lose
In my twenty-fourth year.

The great and the little are only in name.
The smoke from my chimney casts shadows as drear
On the heart, as the smoke from Vesuvius in flame:
And my twenty-fourth year,

From the joys that have cheered it, the cares that have troubled,
What is wise to pursue, what is well to revere,
May judge all as fully as though life were doubled
To its forty-eighth year!

If the prospect grow dim, 't is because it grows wide.
Every loss hath its gain. So, from sphere on to sphere,
Man mounts up the ladder of Time: so I stride
Up my twenty-fourth year!

Exulting? ...no...sorrowing? ...no...with a mind
Whose regret chastens hope, whose faith triumphs o'er fear:
Not repining: not confident: no, but resigned
To my twenty-fourth year.



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