Tis The Set Of The Sail -- Or -- One Ship Sails East

Ella Wheeler Wilcox 1855 (Janesville) – 1919



But to every mind there openeth,
A way, and way, and away,
A high soul climbs the highway,
And the low soul gropes the low,
And in between on the misty flats,
The rest drift to and fro.

But to every man there openeth,
A high way and a low,
And every mind decideth,
The way his soul shall go.

One ship sails East,
And another West,
By the self-same winds that blow,
'Tis the set of the sails
And not the gales,
That tells the way we go.

Like the winds of the sea
Are the waves of time,
As we journey along through life,
'Tis the set of the soul,
That determines the goal,
And not the calm or the strife.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on May 03, 2023

37 sec read
1,128

Quick analysis:

Scheme ABBCXC ACAC XXCDDC XXEFFE
Closest metre Iambic trimeter
Characters 590
Words 125
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 6, 4, 6, 6

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Ella Wheeler Wilcox was an American author and poet. more…

All Ella Wheeler Wilcox poems | Ella Wheeler Wilcox Books

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