The buried life - Matthew Arnold

But often, in the world's most crowded streets,
But often, in the din of strife,
There rises an unspeakable desire,
After the knowledge of our buried life;
A thirst to spend our fire and restless force
In tracking out our true, original course;
A longing to inquire
Into the mystery of this heart which beats
So wild, so deep in us - to know
Whence our lives come and where they go.
And we have been on many thousand lines,
And we have shown, on each, spirit and power;
But hardly have we, for one little hour,
Been on our own line, have we been ourselves -
Hardly had skill to utter one of all
The nameless feelings that course through our breast,
But they course on forever unexpressed.
And long we try in vain to speak and act
Our hidden self, and what we say and do
Is eloquent, is well - but 'tis not true.

Only - but this is rare -
When a beloved hand is laid in ours,
When jaded with the rush and glare
Of the interminable hours,
Our eyes can in another's eyes read clear,
When our world deafen'd ear
Is by the tones of a loved voice caresss'd -
A bolt is shot back somewhere in our breast,
And a lost pulse of feeling stirs again,
The eye sinks inward and the heart lies plain,
And what we mean we say, and what we would, we know.