• The day is dark and the night
• To him that would search their heart;
• No lips of cloud that will part,
• Nor morning song in the light:
• Only, gazing alone,
• To him wild shadows are shown,
• Deep under deep unknown
• And height above unknown height.
• Still we say as we go,—
• 10“Strange to think by the way,
• Whatever there is to know,
• That shall we know one day.”

• The Past is over and fled;
• Named new, we name it the old;
• Thereof some tale hath been told,
• But no word comes from the dead;
• Whether at all they be,
• Or whether as bond or free,
• Or whether they too were we,
• 20Or by what spell they have sped.
• Still we say as we go,—
• “Strange to think by the way,
• Whatever there is to know,
• That shall we know one day.”

• What of the heart of hate
• That beats in thy breast, O Time?—
• Red strife from the furthest prime,
• And anguish of fierce debate;
• War that shatters her slain,
• 30And peace that grinds them as grain,
• And eyes fixed ever in vain
• On the pitiless eyes of Fate.
• Still we say as we go,—
• “Strange to think by the way,
• Whatever there is to know,
• That shall we know one day.”

• What of the heart of love
• That bleeds in thy breast, O Man?—
• Thy kisses snatched 'neath the ban
• 40Of fangs that mock them above;
• Thy bells prolonged unto knells,
• Thy hope that a breath dispels,
• Thy bitter forlorn farewells
• And the empty echoes thereof?
• Still we say as we go,—
• “Strange to think by the way,
• Whatever there is to know,
• That shall we know one day.”

• The sky leans dumb on the sea,
• 50Aweary with all its wings;
• And oh! the song the sea sings
• Is dark everlastingly.
• Our past is clean forgot,
• Our present is and is not,
• Our future's a sealed seedplot,
• And what betwixt them are we?
• What word's to say as we go?
• What thought's to think by the way?
• What truth may there be to know,
• 60And shall we know it one day?

Dante Gabriel Rossetti.