In Immemoriam by Edward Bradley (Cuthbert Bede)

We seek to know, and knowing seek;
We seek, we know, and every sense
Is trembling with the great Intense
And vibrating to what we speak.

We ask too much, we seek too oft,
We know enough, and should no more;
And yet we skim through Fancy’s lore
And look to earth and not aloft.

A something comes from out the gloom;
I know it not, nor seek to know;
I only see it swell and grow,
And more than this world would presume.

Meseems, a circling void I fill,
And I, unchanged where all is changed;
It seems unreal; I own it strange,
Yet nurse the thoughts I cannot kill.

I hear the ocean’s surging tide,
Raise quiring on its carol-tune;
I watch the golden-sickled moon,
And clearer voices call besides.

O Sea! whose ancient ripples lie
On red-ribbed sands where seaweeds shone;
O Moon! whose golden sickle ‘s gone;
O Voices all! like ye I die!

From: Wells, Carolyn (ed.), A Parody Anthology, 1922, Charles Scribner’s Sons: New York, pp. 174-175.
(https://archive.org/details/aparodyantholog01wellgoog)

Date: c1860

By: Edward Bradley (Cuthbert Bede) (1827-1889)

Tags: 1860, cuthbert bede, edward bradley, in immemoriam, poetry, we seek to know and knowing seek