I WATCH the clouds that float along the sky. The city is stiff and grey, In desperate struggle death-locked and frozen, And between the angular, motionless, unbent facades Creak and groan the carts, painfully striving To crawl and push along forward -- for ever in vain. Yet above them move the clouds, free and unfrozen. I watch the clouds that drift along the sky. Through the fracas of life my body's borne and buffeted, Ever resisting impulse, held back yet pushed forward; But my soul watches alone, indifferent and un-changing, By that deep thought in which life and death are one: Which is to me as a lonely torch in the darkness, Consuming, creating its own illumination, Lawless, of all its laws its own fulfilment, Purposeless, of all purposes the creator, Imperishably dead. I watch the clouds that float along the sky. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...COWLEY: THE GARDEN by ALEXANDER POPE THE CLOAK, THE BOAT, AND THE SHOES by WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS PHILOCTETES: PHILOCTETES CALLS FOR DEATH by AESCHYLUS SONG OF THE SERPENT-CHARMERS by EDWIN ARNOLD THE IMPROVISATORE: THE INDUCTION TO THE THIRD FYTTE by THOMAS LOVELL BEDDOES |