Metrical Tales and Other Poems/The Ebb Tide

by Robert Southey

The EBB TIDE.

 

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Slowly thy flowing tide
Came in, old Avon! scarcely did mine eyes,
As watchfully I roam'd thy green-wood side,
Behold the gentle rise.

With many a stroke and strong
The labouring boatmen upward plied their oars,
And yet the eye beheld them labouring long
Between thy winding shores.

Now down thine ebbing tide
The unlaboured boat falls rapidly along;
The solitary helms-man sits to guide
And sings an idle song.

Now o'er the rocks, that lay
So silent late, the shallow current roars;
Fast flow thy waters on their sea-ward way
Thro' wider-spreading shores.

Avon! I gaze and know
The wisdom emblemed in thy varying way;
It speaks of human joys that rise so slow,
So rapidly decay.

Kingdoms that long have stood
And slow to strength and power attain'd at last,
Thus from the summit of high fortune's flood
Ebb to their ruin fast.

So tardily appears
The course of time to manhood's envied stage;
Alas! how hurryingly the ebbing years
Then hasten to old age!