Chapter 22

Travelers' Poems

I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'
Gleams that untravell'd world, whose margin fades
For ever and for ever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use!
As tho' to breathe were life.
Life piled on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains: but every hour is saved
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things...

Alfred Lord Tennyson, England, from Ulysses

Afoot and lighthearted I take to the open road,
Healthy, free, the world before me,
The long brown path before me, leading wherever I choose.
...........................................
From this hour, freedom!
From this hour I ordain myself loos'd of limits and imaginary lines,
Going where I list, my own master, total and absolute,
Listening to others, and considering well what they say,
Pausing, searching, receiving, contemplating,
Gently, but with undeniable will, divesting myself of the hold that would hold me.

Walt Whitman, USA, from Song of the Open Road

I travelled among unknown men,
In lands beyond the sea;
Nor, England! did I know till then
What love I bore to thee.

William Wordsworth, England, from I Travelled Among Unknown Men

Westron wind when wilt thou blow,
That the small rain down can rain.
Ah that my love were in my arms,
And I in my bed again.

A seafarer from long ago

That I lived more bravely,
And loved more deeply.

A backpacker