The Plains

A poem by Laurence Hope (Adela Florence Cory Nicolson)

How one loves them
These wide horizons; whether Desert or Sea, -
Vague and vast and infinite; faintly clear -
Surely, hid in the far away, unknown "There,"
Lie the things so longed for and found not, found not, Here.

Only where some passionate, level land
Stretches itself in reaches of golden sand,
Only where the sea line is joined to the sky-line, clear,
Beyond the curve of ripple or white foamed crest, -
Shall the weary eyes
Distressed by the broken skies, -
Broken by Minaret, mountain, or towering tree, -
Shall the weary eyes be assuaged, - be assuaged, - and rest.