Poems (Gifford)/The New Year
For works with similar titles, see The New Year.
THE NEW YEAR.
This is the New Year! Countless chroniclersOf steady time have struck the midnight hour;And in hushed darkness face to face we standWith the opposing possibilitiesOf this fresh fraction of the centuries,Whose ripples reach unto eternity.Well do we know this New Year shall embraceDesolate winter, glorious summer days,Spring hopefulness, and autumn's sure decay.Now shall the heaven above us be a stretchOf undimmed sunlit azure, and now fleckedWith beauteous cloudlets floating fairy-like;Now shall thick fogs obscure it, and againShall dull, dense masses of dark tempest-cloudHeave in tumultuous billows o'er the sky.Then, yet again, shall mystic night revealIn varied phases the calm, queenly moon;Th' erratic planets and far distant stars,Waking high thoughts of untold, unknown realms.Now shall the fierce wind blow, and now be stayed;Now shall the rain and now the snow prevail;Now frost, now sultry stillness, now soft airs;Now shall the lightning-flash and thunder-pealStrike terror all around; now shall the seaBe lashed to fury, and now undisturbedSave by its never-ceasing ebb and flow.Day after day the sun shall rise and set,Day alternate with night, and the wide worldShall sleep and wake, and sleep and wake again,And all shall typify the changefulnessOf this year's slow-enacting historyOf nations and of every human life.There shall be conflict, victory, defeat,Rebellion, controversy, progress, mirth, Hurry and rush, and stillness all enforced,Festival, funeral, labour, and repose,Luxury, poverty, and love, and hate,And works of kindliness and awful deeds.Here death shall enter, there new life shall come,Here hearts shall blend in happy union,And there be severed, sorrowful and lone;Here shall prosperity succeed to loss,There pain to pleasure, and there rest to toil;But ever where grief awaits good hovers near,And where joy sails some ballast must be borne,Or it will soon capsize.
All this shall be,As in the years that we have known of old;Yet who that greets this dawning of the yearCan surely guess what for himself awaits,Which shall preponderate, or ease, or care?God only knows; but, oh! to know He knows,And orders all with wise, unerring love,Resolves all questioning to trustfulness.Together everything shall work for good,And all shall work towards one glad New YearThat days shall measure not, nor months, a yearWhen all things shall be new—new heavens, new earth,Without or sun or sea; where shall be knownNo fluctuation between pain and peace,But infinite variety of joy.