Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[stream]

Hello,

Could you tell me the meaning of the phrase:
(down) the arches of the years.

Thanks, Yuri

[cgage2]

It really doesn't make a lot of sense. It could be some unusual poetic metaphor, or possibly a poor translation from a computer translator, or non-native translator.
Symbolically speaking, I could say that arches represent stages of time, but it's poor imagery in my opinion. I would forget about it.

[stream]

Thanks, your comment was helpfull for me.

Yuri

[cgage2]

I fled Him, down the nights and down the days;
I fled Him, down the arches of the years;

Thanks for the PM.
I see that I may have been to hasty in judgement. Nevertheless, the imagery isn't that appealing to me. I do appreciate poetry, especially Shakespeare.

[cgage2]

To help answer your question:
The image of arches of the years probably refers to symbols of passing ages in western history. In ancient history, Greeks, Romans, possibly others, and even 19th France built arches to commemarate victories. So you could look at them as sort of long-term chronological type images.
P.S. Poetry is very subjective. It's like some people prefer chocolate ice cream and some people like vanilla.

[stream]

Your new interpretation is interesting by itself and might be
quite correct for this poem. But if we take the whole poem,
it deals with the life of a single man without
any connection with important world happenings.
So I am not quite sure. Anyway I think that
such a vague line conveys the general idea well
enough for understanding: down the nights, down the days
and all that had lasted lots of years in a row. :)

Thanks, Yuri

[CP]

I was not familiar with the poem, so I looked it up and found it is by Francis Thompson (1859-1907), and titled "The Hound of Heaven."

It begins:

I fled Him, down the nights and down the days;
I fled Him, down the arches of the years;
I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways
Of my own mind; and in the mist of tears
I hid from Him, and under running laughter.
Up vistaed hopes I sped;
And shot, precipitated,
Adown Titanic glooms of chasm�d fears,
From those strong Feet that followed, followed after.
But with unhurrying chase,
And unperturb�d pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,
They beat -- and a voice beat
More instant than the Feet --
"All things betray thee, who betrayest Me."

You can read the whole thing here:

http://www.mcs.drexel.edu/~gbrandal/Illum_html/hound.html
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