C.D. Warner, et al., comp.
The Library of the World’s Best Literature. An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.

Roden Berkeley Wriothesley Noel (1834–1894)

THEY are waiting on the shore

For the bark to take them home:

They will toil and grieve no more;

The hour for release hath come.

All their long life lies behind,

Like a dimly blending dream;

There is nothing left to bind

To the realms that only seem.

They are waiting for the boat;

There is nothing left to do:

What was near them grows remote,

Happy silence falls like dew;

Now the shadowy bark is come,

And the weary may go home.

By still water they would rest,

In the shadow of the tree;

After battle, sleep is best,

After noise, tranquillity.