Powerful Poetry: Crossing the Bar

Sunset and evening star,

And one clear call for me!

And may there be no moaning of the bar,

When I put out to sea,

But such a tide as moving seems asleep,

Too full for sound and foam,

When that which drew from out the boundless deep

Turns again home.

Twilight and evening bell,

And after that the dark!

And may there be no sadness of farewell,

When I embark;

For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place

The flood may bear me far,

I hope to see my Pilot face to face

When I have crost the bar.

-"Crossing the Bar", Lord Alfred Tennyson

Lord Alfred Tennyson's "Crossing the Bar" presents a somewhat unconventional idea of death, comparing it to the act of crossing a sand bar and setting out to sea. This is unique compared to the traditional bright lights or warmth or the embrace of deceased family members and lovers. 

I feel like seas, oceans, and other large bodies of water have a morbid reputation in writing, history, and culture. There are no end to stories of hurricanes killing engines, tipping ships, and splitting them open. There are countless tales of people being stranded at sea faced with miles of endless undrinkable water and no land in sight. 

And then of course there is the actual sea life. There's the classic but overblown fear of sharks and other marine predators. Then we also have the bewilderment at deep sea creatures like angler fish and giant squids. Speaking of giant animals, there exists the scientific theory of deep-sea gigantism, that is, deep-sea creatures have the tendency to grow far larger than their sunlight and twilight zone counterparts ever do. Millions of people have made comments that deep sea creatures look like aliens and that we know more about the surface of the moon than the bottom of our oceans. 

All this is to say that while beaches usually have the pleasure of flaunting fun and relaxing reputations, actual oceans and seas tend to end up in works of horror, tragedy, and survival. Because of this, I find it admirable that Tennyson takes the generally unnerving concept of death, the generally unnerving concept of going out to sea, and combines them to make something comforting. 

One element that I believe helps create this feeling is the anticipation. Whether you interpret the "one clear call" and "evening bell" as the blowing of a large ship's horn or the beckoning of the captain of a commercial fishing vessel, the idea of a call or bell like them implies that they were planned. The departures of sailing vessels are scheduled and expected. There is nothing sudden about them. Tennyson has clearly acknowledged his mortality and knows that one day he will make his voyage as well. 

Besides this, Tennyson also believes his death will be slow. While in most scenarios a slow death is depicted as being undesirable and painful, Tennyson seems to view it positively, as such a pace allows it to be gentle. He states that the tide almost seems to be asleep, drawing comparison to the idea of someone dying in their sleep. Regardless of someone's background and beliefs, dying in one's sleep is pretty much the universally desired way to die. 

In addition to his direct descriptions, there are other ways in which his word choice forces the reader to acknowledge the slow and serene nature of Tennyson's eventual death. In the second stanza he states that the tide moves so slowly and is so full that it seems silent and motionless. This fullness is reflected in the verses themselves, as verses 5 and 7 don't roll off the tongue very smoothly. They are lengthy, and verse 7 in particular is stuffed with conjunctions, prepositions, and pronouns that trip me up and twist my tongue. It is basically impossible to move through these lines quickly or obnoxiously- you are force to carefully and delicately slide around every syllable.  

In comparison, most of the other verses in the poem are much shorter and simpler. Due to this, it feels to me as if the wording here was an extremely deliberate choice to slow the reader down and force them to match the pace of the tide.

Tennyson also does not express any frustration or fear towards death and makes no mention of trying to delay it. The analogy to the departure of a ship further emphasizes this. A ship leaves when it leaves. If a single passenger were to ask the crew to wait a while longer before leaving, they would be mocked and laughed at. It's such an absurd and entitled request that most people would never dare make it. By setting up this comparison, Tennyson recognizes that he can't cheat death or change fate.

The only person on a ship that has the authority to delay its departure is its captain. Similarly, Tennyson seems to say that the only person or thing that can delay his death is his Pilot. While not a topic addressed by the poem, I think that this comparison presents a slightly more digestible version of the phrase "God works in mysterious ways". The physics of sailing are complex and difficult to understand for the average person. There are no doubt hundreds of factors at play, most of which laypeople are not aware of. A captain's decision to depart at a certain time may seem arbitrary and nonsensical to passengers when in reality the decision is delicately balanced between countless factors. 

Beyond all of this, Tennyson's description of God as his Pilot implies a great deal of unwavering faith in and respect for his creator. The passengers of a ship put their trust in their captain to safely navigate the water for them, as do the passengers of a flight. Had Tennyson acknowledged the certainty of fate but not trusted his God's skill in handling it, I highly doubt he would have referred to him as his Pilot. It is one thing to recognize that your life is steered by the will of a deity (after all, such is the premise of the vast majority of religions). It is something else to follow that path without hesitation or question. To not mutter "Why God?" or not wonder why good things happen to bad people, that is something that most people seem incapable of (and very understandably so, in my opinion). 

Going back to the idea of seas and oceans being terrifying, perhaps it is the titanic contrast between the uncertainty and horror of the sea and the steadfastness of Tennyson's faith that makes "Crossing the Bar" so comforting. To approach something so vast and obscure with the same confidence that a fox would approach snatching a chicken, it shows that Tennyson's faith is truly unshakable. Any level of faith less than that would collapse, or crack, or at minimum sway in the face of a such a deep unknown. A comparison that comes to mind for me is someone playing a no armor, no upgrades, no weapons run of a video game. As you watch the player approach a boss baring none of the tools they normally need to defeat their foe, you understand that the player possesses an enormous amount of skill to perform such a feat

Tennyson knows he will die someday. He believes that God and God alone determines when that happens. And he has zero doubt in His judgement. I don't share these beliefs. I detest the idea of someone resigning themselves to "fate". I think it's severely lacking in self-efficacy and accountability. 

Despite my disagreement though, I have an immense amount of respect for Tennyson's mental clarity. His mind and heart are clear. There is no force in this universe that could steer him away from his commitment. Religion is nothing if not a coping mechanism. For Tennyson to wield it as an unskewable compass, I am happy he is able to find that level of inner peace. A raging inner turmoil absolutely reduces one's self-efficacy, and so perhaps in a bizarre way, Tennyson's resignation to his fate simultaneously empowers him. 

Tennyson's use of the sea also alludes to life and death being cyclical in nature. While ocean currents travel for thousands of miles around the earth, wrapping around entire continents, they are still bound to the path they travel. A particular droplet of water will eventually end back up at the place it began. The wave of human life comes in from the boundless deep and eventually returns to it. One day this wave will again leave the boundless deep and rush to the shores.

One possible interpretation of this oceanic cycle is that of reincarnation. However, given Tennyson's Anglican upbringing, I highly doubt he was writing "Crossing the Bar" with this in mind. But I am a strong supporter of the death of the author and birth of the reader. So, I say more power to anyone who views his writing in the context of reincarnation. 

And if we want to get into physics, there is a sort of scientific reincarnation in the sense that matter can neither be created nor destroyed. The "stuff" that makes up you started out as clouds of cosmic dust, then became rocky cliffs of earth, then probably some prehistoric animals, dinosaurs, then early humans, and eventually ended up in the form of you. Of course, nobody considers these events part of their human experience because, as far as human consciousness and being alive is concerned, they weren't. But still - once you die, the molecules that make up your body don't disappear. They became something else. You won't know, won't be aware, but the laws of thermodynamics don't particularly care about how you feel about them.

Regarding other cycles though, there is the idea that life and death are a single general cycle encompassing all life rather than a near endless number of cycles for every individual living organism. Individual people, animals, and other creatures are born and so enter this cycle, and then inevitably exit when they die. But as they die, others are born and enter the cycle. No single being stays in the cycle forever, but the cycle continues because there is always something new coming in. It's like a revolving door. 

When Tennyson asks that nobody grieve his eventual death, it strikes me as his acceptance that he is part of this greater cycle. He will die and be removed from it, but something will take his place. There is no net loss occurring. Things will progress as they are supposed to. To grieve his death would be to grieve flowers dying as the seasons turn to winter or cicadas dying as they emerge from the ground and sing.

This cycle can be further looked at from two perspectives. One is that of God's will. God creates all things with the intention that they will someday die. This view further cements Tennyson's unshakable faith in his God. He fully trusts His design of all His creations despite the paradoxical situation in which a loving and all-powerful God creates beings that will suffer and eventually die. 

The other perspective is that of biology. All sorts of scientists have researched the phenomena of birth, aging, dying, and death. And for the vast majority of organisms, including us humans, it is unavoidable. The telomeres on the tips of our genes just get so short that cells can't divide anymore. Now of course there are the bizarre exceptions - bacteria lying dormant in Antarctic ice for thousands of years or jellyfish being functionally immortal. But for almost everything else- being born means one day you are also going to die. 

And so for as tragic as death is- it's natural. It happens. All the time. And while we humans lament that it cuts our relationships short, ends the time that we spend with loved ones, and keeps incredibly talented people from continuing to share their gifts with the world, those social phenomena came along far after the cycle of life and death began. Long before we went to concerts, planned road trips, and bet on fantasy football matches, our ancient ancestors were crawling out of the sea, guided by little more than primal instincts and reflexes. And long before that, our super ancient ancestors were single celled organisms, mindlessly swimming around in the sea with no instincts to speak of. 

We may adorn ourselves with jewelry, write books, and compose music, but that is all superfluous. At our very core, we are still just beasts following our senses and reflexes in order to live another day. We may consider ourselves evolved, looking at the millions of years that have passed between the first terrestrial animals and our existence. But all it takes is a single crisis- a gruesome car accident, a robbery at gunpoint, a natural disaster- to instantly yank us back through millions of years of evolution and force us to abandon all our social and societal niceties. And the cycle of life and death reminds us of that, reminds us of where we came from and how easily and quickly we can be returned to it, and how one day we all inevitably WILL return to it. 

Now Tennyson being Anglican brings the idea of heaven into the picture. As he confronts his inevitable death, he sees it not as the total cessation of his existence, but as a change in its form. After all, he expresses his desire to meet God which implies he hopes to enter heaven. In some ways, his belief in heaven makes his faith seem a bit less steadfast. He doesn't believe he is facing oblivion and utter annihilation, but instead a transition. Nobody can say what his attitude would have been like had he been writing without a belief in an afterlife. 

Despite that though- my respect remains the same. Regardless of someone's belief in an afterlife, being totally accepting of death is hard. Whether you think you'll go to heaven, or fade into nothingness, or start a totally different life anew, first you've got to have that massive heart attack, or get hit by that bus, or get cut down by septic shock that spreads to every corner of your body. For Tennyson in specific, he had to suffer through a few years of gout before succumbing to an unspecified illness that most sources I've read assume to be influenza.

While his serene acceptance of his eventual death and his unwavering faith in his God strike a profound chord in me, I realize that to some particularly devout persons they may not be all that impressive. Of course he would put complete trust in God, of course he would not reject a fate that his God had planned for him. Such is an ask of any denomination of Christianity. 

But it is unimaginably impressive to me. I will never attain that level of spiritual clarity in my life, not anything even remotely close to it, not even a drop of it. I will always doubt, always question, always agonize, always worry, always brood, always ask for reason, - there is no god (Christian or otherwise) that could ever make a faithful servant out of me. 

And I say that without any arrogance or prejudice. I am simply stating it as it is- accepting the truth. I know it in my heart of hearts, as did Tennyson know his faith in his heart of hearts. A penguin shouldn't spend its time wondering why it can't fly. 

Yet to see Tennyson so eloquently and warmly depict unyielding faith- teasing it out just as gently as his foam-filled tide rolls in, forging it not as a righteous hammer or blade to pass judgement with but as an unbreakable cane to support himself even when he stumbles, it makes me happy. That some people are so certain. That peace can be found. That where some people find parched and barren rocks, others find swelling streams.

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