Day Lewis, Cecil: O Dreams, O Destinations (9)

9

To travel like a bird, lightly to view

Deserts where stone gods founder in the sand,

Ocean embraced in a white sleep with land;

To escape time, always to start anew.

To settle like a bird, make one devoted

Gesture of permanence upon the spray

Of shaken stars and autumns: in a bay

Beyond the crestfallen surges to have floated.

Each is our wish. Alas, the bird flies blind,

Hooded by a dark sense of destination:

Her weight on the glass calm leaves no impression,

Her home is soon a basketful of wind.

Travellers, we are fabric of the road we go;

We settle, but like feathers on time's flow.