When Israel out of Egypt came,
Safe in the sea they trod;
By day in cloud, by night in flame,
Went on before them God.
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He brought them with a stretched-out hand
Dry-footed through the foam
Past sword and famine, rock and sand,
Lust and rebellion, home.
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I never out of Horeb heard
The blast of Advent blow;
No fire-faced prophet brought me word
Which way behoved me go.
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Ascended is the cloudy flame,
The mount of thunder, dumb;
The tokens that to Israel came,
To me they have not come.
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I see the city far away
Where I shall never stand;
The heart goes where no footstep may
Into the promised land.
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The realm I look upon and die
Another man will own;
He shall attain the heaven that I
Perish and have not known.
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But I will go where they are hid
That never were begot,
To my inheritance amid
The nation that is not.
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One of the most masterful things by chronically hopeful pessimist A.E. Housman (1859-1936), who has been featured previously in the Classic Poetry Group, here and here.
In a certain mood, there is hardly a better tonic. A despair that dares to hold up its head, proclaiming, “So be it,” as defiant in its own way as Henley’s "Invictus."
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As Housman himself wrote about his own work:
'Tis true, the stuff I bring for sale
Is not so brisk a brew as ale:
Out of a stem that scored the hand
I wrung it in a weary land.
But take it: if the smack is sour,
Tis better for the embittered hour…
And I will friend you if I may,
In the dark and cloudy day.
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I have always admired the way "When Israel Out of Egypt Came" starts with the fanfare of a classic hymn, detours, betrays expectation, and forces the reader’s voice to go diminuendo in the last stanza, if read aloud.
Some connection is natural with Psalm 114, which has many fine translations and musical settings.
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To my surprise, I recently stumbled upon what appeared as if it might be a direct predecessor against which Housman might have been reacting.
Henry J. Zelley was an American Methodist minister born in 1859 in Mt. Holly, N.J. He was an earnest promoter of the evangelical “camp-meeting” movement and author of some 1,500 poems, hymns and religious songs, according to hymnary.org. Here is one of them:
When Israel out of bondage came,
A sea before them lay;
My Lord reached down His mighty hand,
And rolled the sea away.
Refrain
Then forward still—’tis Jehovah’s will,
Though the billows dash and spray.
With a conq’ring tread we will push ahead;
He’ll roll the sea away.
Before me was a sea of sin,
So great I feared to pray;
My heart’s desire the Savior read,
And rolled the sea away. [Refrain]
When sorrows dark, like stormy waves,
Were dashing o’er my way,
Again the Lord in mercy came,
And rolled the sea away. [Refrain]
And when I reach the sea of death,
For needed grace I’ll pray;
I know the Lord will quickly come,
And roll the sea away. [Refrain]
Housman could have possibly heard this somewhere or other, since it dates to 1896, when the poet was not yet 40. Reportedly, it appeared in 55 different hymnals.
Or it may only be representative of the kind of certainty the poem rejects.
I was unable to date Housman’s "When Israel Out of Egypt Came"; apparently it appeared in print only after the poet's death.
The composer of the hymn's tune, Henry Lake Gilmour, a native of Ireland, served in the American Civil War on the Union side, was captured, and survived several months as a POW in Libby Prison, Richmond, Va. He is credited with many gospel compositions.
I couldn't find an audio for the hymn, but anyone who has a piano or other instrument, or a knack for sight-singing, might try it. It is in E-flat major, singable and catchy, though not brilliant IMO. The Housman poem fits (although ending a stanza with the closed sound of "not" feels quite odd).
Whether you yourself may have survived your own Red Sea--as Gilmour evidently did--or may be struggling, or may feel more, like the poet, above and beyond certain sorts of hope, it’s my hope that any reader here may find something of value.
Thanks for being here.
My favorite line in the Housman poem: "The heart goes where no footstep may.” Standing alone, encloses many potential meanings. Even as an epitaph, one might do worse.
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These fragments I have shored against my ruins. --T.S. Eliot
Against the ruin of the world, there is only one defense: the creative act. —Kenneth Rexroth
More on DKos:
Classic Poetry Group
FreeWriters
Readers and Book Lovers (with full schedule of literary diaries)