We had no wish for the storm in the night,
For the weary cold of the morning light
On the helpless ruin which proves its might …
But wait and watch now the work is done,
For we are the lost when the dawn is come.
A million beings who have lived alone
And perished alone in each house of stone,
A shell of lime both a tomb and a home.
Torn from the sea in a night of storm –
Cast on the beach to die in the dawn.
For us the aeons of time to come
Exist no more. They are gone and one
With the aeons of time from which we sprung.
A million hopes on the edge of time –
A million hopes make one heap of lime.
To be shattered to sand by the next storm’s power,
Or sealed in the rocks and preserved for an hour.
An hour or a year; an aeon or more;
Time comes to an end for this legion of lost
For whose measure of life death is the cost.
But all is not lost. We have clouded the sea
With the mist of the hopes that are yet to be –
Great drifts of spores far too small to see.
Our mission on earth has been fulfilled;
The rhythm of life will not be stilled.
The lime will be gathered once more into shell,
Until yet again will toll the death knell
In the moaning wind and the surging swell.
Dust and the rocks weakly tremble to life
To perish again in helpless strife.
Dust and our lives go hand in hand
On a road through the seas and the shifting land;
We crumble and change from flesh to sand.
A million dead and a million more
Mark the course of this road as it winds by the shore,
Past the unknown lives become heaps of lime,
Past men in their pride and worms in their slime,
Past the lost ones strewn on the edge of time.
Dust becomes life as flame becomes flame
Without pausing for hope, for despair, or for shame.
We are the soul of a drifting star.
We are life and dust, we are near and far,
The screaming gull and the shy evejar.
We are the mist and the bright sunlight,
We are the storm in the night.
RAE, 1971
We had no wish for the storm in the night,
For the weary cold of the morning light
On the helpless ruin which proves its might …
But wait and watch now the work is done,
For we are the lost when the dawn is come.
A million beings who have lived alone
And perished alone in each house of stone,
A shell of lime both a tomb and a home.
Torn from the sea in a night of storm –
Cast on the beach to die in the dawn.
For us the aeons of time to come
Exist no more. They are gone and one
With the aeons of time from which we sprung.
A million hopes on the edge of time –
A million hopes make one heap of lime.
To be shattered to sand by the next storm’s power,
Or sealed in the rocks and preserved for an hour.
An hour or a year; an aeon or more;
Time comes to an end for this legion of lost
For whose measure of life death is the cost.
But all is not lost. We have clouded the sea
With the mist of the hopes that are yet to be –
Great drifts of spores far too small to see.
Our mission on earth has been fulfilled;
The rhythm of life will not be stilled.
The lime will be gathered once more into shell,
Until yet again will toll the death knell
In the moaning wind and the surging swell.
Dust and the rocks weakly tremble to life
To perish again in helpless strife.
Dust and our lives go hand in hand
On a road through the seas and the shifting land;
We crumble and change from flesh to sand.
A million dead and a million more
Mark the course of this road as it winds by the shore,
Past the unknown lives become heaps of lime,
Past men in their pride and worms in their slime,
Past the lost ones strewn on the edge of time.
Dust becomes life as flame becomes flame
Without pausing for hope, for despair, or for shame.
We are the soul of a drifting star.
We are life and dust, we are near and far,
The screaming gull and the shy evejar.
We are the mist and the bright sunlight,
We are the storm in the night.
RAE, 1971