DISCOVERED:
UNDOCUMENTED POEM BY ALEISTER CROWLEY
BY
BARRY VAN-ASTEN

 

In the course of my research on the early poetry of Aleister Crowley I discovered an ‘undocumented’ poem by him. I made the discovery on Monday 28^th September 2026 to be precise, while searching specifically for the poem and as you can imagine the discovery had a profound affect upon me, knowing that the poem had remained unseen for well over a century. The poem is rather curious and beautiful as it reflects Crowley’s spiritual transition at the time he became an undergraduate of Trinity College, Cambridge, prior to his revelation, or spiritual crises in Amsterdam of December 1897. I made a thorough search for references or any previous publication of the poem, consulting among others, Churton, Sutin, Booth and Kaczynski’s ‘Perdurabo’ etc. and found that it had not been referenced or documented. I remained silent as to the finding of the poem for several days before I made the decision to contact that great sage, Richard Kaczynski prior to the 151^st Anniversary of Crowley’s birth on 12^th October, but after two failed attempts to reach the almighty wizard, I decided to remain silent for a while longer and publish the poem myself. I often find nature simplifies many decisions and shunts one in the most beneficial direction. I certainly wanted nothing of gain by the discovery, except only that it should be known to others in the Crowley community and exist in the bibliographical archive correctly classified for future research. I took the decision to inform the 100^th Monkey Press online bibliographical resource. As for the poem –

In Crowley’s volume ‘Olla: An Anthology of Sixty Years of Song’ published in London by the OTO (1946), we find on page 17 a fragment of a strange little poem titled ‘My First Poem’:

 

I am a blind man on a helmless ship,
Without a compass, on a stormy sea;
I cannot sink, for God doth hold me up;
I cannot stray (? Err): ‘tis God that guideth me. Etc.’

 

He gives the location of the writing of the poem as ‘Cambridge, England.’ and adds a footnote, saying ‘That is if memory serves me truly. I am not quite sure of the exact wording of the last two lines. There was two or three verses to follow. It was published in “The Christian” and Evangelical (or Non-Conformist?) Weekly some short time after the death of my father on March 5, 1887 e.v. Some years back I tried to trace the paper in vain.’ The fragmentary poem was published in ‘The Spirit of Solitude’, volume 1, 1929 (p. 69) and in ‘The Confessions of Aleister Crowley’, 1969, (p. 73) where he says ‘as late as 1894, I think it must be, I find myself writing hymns of quite acceptable piety. One was published in the Christian; it began:

 

I am a blind man on a helmless ship
Without a compass on a stormy sea.
I cannot sink, for God will hold me up.’

As I said, I found the poem Crowley refers to in a periodical called The Christian (a weekly publication established in 1870 by Morgan and Scott, London), issue number 1343, dated 24^th October, 1895, on page 11: The poem is titled –

 

IN DOUBT
 
I am a blind man on a helmless ship,
Without a compass on a stormy sea;
I cannot sink, for God doth hold me up;
I cannot steer, for God is guiding me.
 
I am a mountaineer in mist and night,
Wildly the wind whirls whistling o’er the wold;
I cannot find the way, for God leads right,
I cannot fall, for God’s strong hand doth hold.
 
I a ma friendless wanderer all alone,
Helpless and homeless do I vaguely roam;
I cannot starve, for God will hear me groan,
I am not lost, for God will find a home.
 
And so I leave the future to his care,
My heart unfathomed, He will show me clear;
And with blind faith I straightly onward dare
The path unknown, and faint not, neither fear.

 

The poem has the following name (correct spelling) at the end: ‘A. Allister Crowley.’ which is probably a printing error. The ‘Principle Contents’ on the front page (page 1) also gives ‘In Doubt (poem)……11’. It is a rather fascinating little poem and I hope Crowley would be pleased at my discovering it so that it may be added to its rightful place among his poetic output and given to the world to admire!

 

The Citation for the poem is:

Graduate Theological Union Library and Archives, 2400 Ridge Road, Berkeley, California, 94709, USA. Collection: The Christian, Periodicals, Americana Texts, Collection Number: Col-1272. [Identifier: Christian0000Vari_1895] Volume 1895, The Christian, 24^th October 1895, issue 1343, p. 11, poem ‘In Doubt’, Crowley, A. Allister (1895 volume p. 984).