Convergence Of The Twain

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  I

  In a solitude of the sea
  Deep from human vanity,
And the Pride of Life that planned her, stilly couches she.

  II

  Steel chambers, late the pyres
  Of her salamandrine fires,
Cold currents thrid, and turn to rhythmic tidal lyres.

  III

  Over the mirrors meant
  To glass the opulent
The sea-worm crawls -- grotesque, slimed, dumb, indifferent.

  IV

  Jewels in joy designed
  To ravish the sensuous mind
Lie lightless, all their sparkles bleared and black and blind.

  V

  Dim moon-eyed fishes near
  Gaze at the gilded gear
And query: "What does this vaingloriousness down here?". . .

  VI

  Well: while was fashioning
  This creature of cleaving wing,
The Immanent Will that stirs and urges everything

  VII

  Prepared a sinister mate
  For her -- so gaily great --
A Shape of Ice, for the time fat and dissociate.

  VIII

  And as the smart ship grew
  In stature, grace, and hue
In shadowy silent distance grew the Iceberg too.

  IX

  Alien they seemed to be:
  No mortal eye could see
The intimate welding of their later history.

  X

  Or sign that they were bent
  By paths coincident
On being anon twin halves of one August event,

  XI

  Till the Spinner of the Years
  Said "Now!" And each one hears,
And consummation comes, and jars two hemispheres.

© Thomas Hardy