The Lotos Eaters by Alfred Lord Tennyson (Poem & Summary)

 

The Lotos Eaters

by Alfred Lord Tennyson

(Poem & Summary) 

The Lotos Eaters

"Courage!" he said, and pointed toward the land,

"This mounting wave will roll us shoreward soon."

In the afternoon they came unto a land

In which it seemed always afternoon.

All round the coast the languid air did swoon,

Breathing like one that hath a weary dream.

Full-faced above the valley stood the moon;

And like a downward smoke, the slender stream

Along the cliff to fall and pause and fall did seem.

 

A land of streams! some, like a downward smoke,

Slow-dropping veils of thinnest lawn, did go;

And some thro' wavering lights and shadows broke,

Rolling a slumbrous sheet of foam below.

They saw the gleaming river seaward flow

From the inner land: far off, three mountain-tops,

Three silent pinnacles of aged snow,

Stood sunset-flush'd: and, dew'd with showery drops,

Up-clomb the shadowy pine above the woven copse.

 

The charmed sunset linger'd low adown

In the red West: thro' mountain clefts the dale

Was seen far inland, and the yellow down

Border'd with palm, and many a winding vale

And meadow, set with slender galingale;

A land where all things always seem'd the same!

And round about the keel with faces pale,

Dark faces pale against that rosy flame,

The mild-eyed melancholy Lotos-eaters came.

 

Branches they bore of that enchanted stem,

Laden with flower and fruit, whereof they gave

To each, but whoso did receive of them,

And taste, to him the gushing of the wave

Far far away did seem to mourn and rave

On alien shores; and if his fellow spake,

His voice was thin, as voices from the grave;

And deep-asleep he seem'd, yet all awake,

And music in his ears his beating heart did make.

 

They sat them down upon the yellow sand,

Between the sun and moon upon the shore;

And sweet it was to dream of Fatherland,

Of child, and wife, and slave; but evermore

Most weary seem'd the sea, weary the oar,

Weary the wandering fields of barren foam.

Then some one said, "We will return no more";

And all at once they sang, "Our island home

Is far beyond the wave; we will no longer roam."

 

Choric Song

I

There is sweet music here that softer falls

Than petals from blown roses on the grass,

Or night-dews on still waters between walls

Of shadowy granite, in a gleaming pass;

Music that gentlier on the spirit lies,

Than tir'd eyelids upon tir'd eyes;

Music that brings sweet sleep down from the blissful skies.

Here are cool mosses deep,

And thro' the moss the ivies creep,

And in the stream the long-leaved flowers weep,

And from the craggy ledge the poppy hangs in sleep."

 

II

Why are we weigh'd upon with heaviness,

And utterly consumed with sharp distress,

While all things else have rest from weariness?

All things have rest: why should we toil alone,

We only toil, who are the first of things,

And make perpetual moan,

Still from one sorrow to another thrown:

Nor ever fold our wings,

And cease from wanderings,

Nor steep our brows in slumber's holy balm;

Nor harken what the inner spirit sings,

"There is no joy but calm!"

Why should we only toil, the roof and crown of things?

 

III

Lo! in the middle of the wood,

The folded leaf is woo'd from out the bud

With winds upon the branch, and there

Grows green and broad, and takes no care,

Sun-steep'd at noon, and in the moon

Nightly dew-fed; and turning yellow

Falls, and floats adown the air.

Lo! sweeten'd with the summer light,

The full-juiced apple, waxing over-mellow,

Drops in a silent autumn night.

All its allotted length of days

The flower ripens in its place,

Ripens and fades, and falls, and hath no toil,

Fast-rooted in the fruitful soil.

 

IV

Hateful is the dark-blue sky,

Vaulted o'er the dark-blue sea.

Death is the end of life; ah, why

Should life all labour be?

Let us alone. Time driveth onward fast,

And in a little while our lips are dumb.

Let us alone. What is it that will last?

All things are taken from us, and become

Portions and parcels of the dreadful past.

Let us alone. What pleasure can we have

To war with evil? Is there any peace

In ever climbing up the climbing wave?

All things have rest, and ripen toward the grave

In silence; ripen, fall and cease:

Give us long rest or death, dark death, or dreamful ease.

 

V

How sweet it were, hearing the downward stream,

With half-shut eyes ever to seem

Falling asleep in a half-dream!

To dream and dream, like yonder amber light,

Which will not leave the myrrh-bush on the height;

To hear each other's whisper'd speech;

Eating the Lotos day by day,

To watch the crisping ripples on the beach,

And tender curving lines of creamy spray;

To lend our hearts and spirits wholly

To the influence of mild-minded melancholy;

To muse and brood and live again in memory,

With those old faces of our infancy

Heap'd over with a mound of grass,

Two handfuls of white dust, shut in an urn of brass!

 

VI

Dear is the memory of our wedded lives,

And dear the last embraces of our wives

And their warm tears: but all hath suffer'd change:

For surely now our household hearths are cold,

Our sons inherit us: our looks are strange:

And we should come like ghosts to trouble joy.

Or else the island princes over-bold

Have eat our substance, and the minstrel sings

Before them of the ten years' war in Troy,

And our great deeds, as half-forgotten things.

Is there confusion in the little isle?

Let what is broken so remain.

The Gods are hard to reconcile:

'Tis hard to settle order once again.

There is confusion worse than death,

Trouble on trouble, pain on pain,

Long labour unto aged breath,

Sore task to hearts worn out by many wars

And eyes grown dim with gazing on the pilot-stars.

 

VII

But, propt on beds of amaranth and moly,

How sweet (while warm airs lull us, blowing lowly)

With half-dropt eyelid still,

Beneath a heaven dark and holy,

To watch the long bright river drawing slowly

His waters from the purple hill—

To hear the dewy echoes calling

From cave to cave thro' the thick-twined vine—

To watch the emerald-colour'd water falling

Thro' many a wov'n acanthus-wreath divine!

Only to hear and see the far-off sparkling brine,

Only to hear were sweet, stretch'd out beneath the pine.

 

VIII

The Lotos blooms below the barren peak:

The Lotos blows by every winding creek:

All day the wind breathes low with mellower tone:

Thro' every hollow cave and alley lone

Round and round the spicy downs the yellow Lotos-dust is blown.

We have had enough of action, and of motion we,

Roll'd to starboard, roll'd to larboard, when the surge was seething free,

Where the wallowing monster spouted his foam-fountains in the sea.

Let us swear an oath, and keep it with an equal mind,

In the hollow Lotos-land to live and lie reclined

On the hills like Gods together, careless of mankind.

For they lie beside their nectar, and the bolts are hurl'd

Far below them in the valleys, and the clouds are lightly curl'd

Round their golden houses, girdled with the gleaming world:

Where they smile in secret, looking over wasted lands,

Blight and famine, plague and earthquake, roaring deeps and fiery sands,

Clanging fights, and flaming towns, and sinking ships, and praying hands.

But they smile, they find a music centred in a doleful song

Steaming up, a lamentation and an ancient tale of wrong,

Like a tale of little meaning tho' the words are strong;

Chanted from an ill-used race of men that cleave the soil,

Sow the seed, and reap the harvest with enduring toil,

Storing yearly little dues of wheat, and wine and oil;

Till they perish and they suffer—some, 'tis whisper'd—down in hell

Suffer endless anguish, others in Elysian valleys dwell,

Resting weary limbs at last on beds of asphodel.

Surely, surely, slumber is more sweet than toil, the shore

Than labour in the deep mid-ocean, wind and wave and oar;

O, rest ye, brother mariners, we will not wander more.

 

Summary

One of Ulysses’ mariners, after a weary journey on the seas, points to a land that comes into his sight and addressing his companions tells them that soon the high wave will take their boat to that land. The poet than describes the land of the lotos eaters and having reached there Ulysses’ companions find that it is a pleasant land and that the air there is moving slowly which looks like the breathing of a tired man who has fallen asleep and while dreaming in sleep breathes very slowly. The moon there was standing full in the sky and there was also a thin stream which fell from a rock and then stood there for a while before moving downward further.

Ulysses and his companions find that it was a land of many streams some of which looked like thin veil of gauze slowly moving like a lazy sheet of foam. They also saw that the mountain peaks were covered with old snow on which the light of the sun was falling. There were pine trees on which the drops of water were there and the heads of those trees were upward in the sky

It was the land where the lotos eaters lived. The sun at that time was going to set in the west but it was taking some time to do so. The valley was in the middle of that land between the mountains the margins of which were yellow because of the light of the setting sun falling on them and around those valleys were palm trees. There were meadows covered with soft galingale grass but the land was always the same with no changes being visible.

The residents of the lotos land when they came near the mariners were holding branches of the lotus tree and on those branches, there were lotos flowers and fruits. As they came there, they gave those branches to each of the mariners. The mariners as soon as they tasted the fruit became completely changed men. Though the waves of the sea were moving towards them yet to them it seemed that they were moving away from them to unknown and far away shores and when those mariners spoke to one another, their voices too had changed. Their voices became very thin as a result of eating lotos fruits and it seemed as if they were speaking from their graves and it also appeared as if those mariners were sleeping although in reality, they were awake and not sleeping.

Having eaten the Lotus fruit the marines lay down upon the sand of the sea of the Lotus land and as it was the evening time the poet calls it the time between the sun and the moon. Under the effect of Lotus fruit though they began to think of their native land and of their wives and children yet now they had no will left in them to go and meet them. In the meantime, one of them cried aloud that they would return no more to their land and people and the same sentiment was echoed by his other companions. Such was the effect of the Lotus fruit on them.

Then all the marines began to sing together in one voice. They sang about the music of the lotos land and the music on their years fell more softly than the Lotos petals falling on the grass and equally tenderly fell the night dews on the motionless waters of the lake between the dark granite walls of the mountain. It is the effect of the music of that land that calls for the comforting sleep from the happy skies. There were the ivy creepers which were growing among the cool mosses and the dews were falling from the long leaved flowers growing in the waters of those streams and there was also the smell of the poppy plant growing among the ledges made in the rocks.

The mariners comparing their lives with the objects of nature complain that in nature all things have rest while man alone is destined to labour and has no rest. Man is said to be the best creation of nature yet he is always moving and working and unlike the birds cannot fold his wings for rest. He is never allowed to rest from labour nor allowed to enjoy the balmy sleep nor allowed to listen to his inner voice that says that in life there is peace but no joy. All in all man is never allowed to rest from toil.

According to the mariners in nature all plants naturally grow into their leaves and buds which become flowers and fruits without any labour on their part. Nature does all the work for them. The wind, the sun, the moon and dews at night make the fruit juicy and apples are filled with juice during the autumn season. All things in nature have their allotted days : they ripen, fall and die and for all this they are least required to labour.

The mariners in the Lotos land are of the view that there is no pleasure or joy in life and there is all the pleasure in having rest and not working at all either in the form of death or of dreamful rest. It is no use struggling in life because all things are heading towards their death. Death is the ultimate goal of life and sleep and rest are different forms of death. So, death or rest is preferable to life and living.

The mariners now imagine that life should be full of dreams which means it is half awakened and half asleep. This kind of life they can have on the lotos land only while eating the lotos and growing old and doing nothing but watching the waves of the sea and see them striking against each other into fine creamy sprays. While on the lotos land they can afford to be influenced totally by the sad memories of the people of their earlier days and in imagination they can think about them who in bodies are now buried and covered by grass and all that remains of them now is only two handful of dust stored in an urn of brass.

The mariners now say that the memory of their wives and their warm embraces and tears are comforting to us in thought but now all must have changed in Ithaca. If they return home they may not find a warm welcome because it is long time since they departed from their homes and wives and their figures have now much changed and in their Island they may be taken to be ghosts by their people. It is equally possible that suitors from the nearby Islands have usurped all that once belonged to them. It is equally possible that there has been disorder in their kingdom in their absence and now they may not be in a position to restore order there. The fact must also be considered that because of the long war and looking at pole star for long hours for the guidance of their boat their eyesight has become very dull. For all these reasons they give up the idea of their home return.

The mariners sing to themselves that it is extremely pleasant to lie down here on the flowers of amaranth and moly under the dark and holy sky and they with half shut eyes can look at the emerald colour waters falling from the purple hills that bring ringing sound from the caves which are covered with vine creepers and it is also really very pleasant to sea and hear from this distance the waves of the sea which are shining because of the bright sun while they themselves are resting under the shadow of the tall pine trees.

The mariners now sing that the lotos are seen blooming on the Island on every hill top and creek of the hill and low and soft wind is blowing all the time and there are spicy plants on the hill slopes. Remembering their past sea life they say that they had enough toil, movement and adventure. They have been rolled over in their boat from one side to the other as the boat was rolled by the waves of the sea while the sea monster spouted more water into the sea. They suggest that they must take an oath never to return from that place but to permanently live there. They say that on this Island they will live like Greek gods and will not listen to the cries and miseries of mankind who have to suffer famine, plague, earthquake, troublesome sea and burning sand. Like gods they will drink nectar instead of water and will be indifferent to the pains and worries of human beings. Like gods again they will have pleasure in listening to the cries and moans of the people on earth. They will laugh at the hard labour which the human beings have to undertake for the ordinary necessities of food and drink and they will also like to see human beings dying and being killed. They will be happy to see human beings after their death going to hell and suffering their worst. For all these reasons they decide not to return to their homes and not to lose the blissful life they have on the lotos Island.