Part 2 (1/2)

Bound in thy briny bed and gnawing earth With foamy writhing and fierce-panted tides, Thou art as Fate in torment of a dearth Of black disaster and destruction's strides.

And how thou dost drive silence from the world, Incarnate Motion of all mystery!

Whose waves are fury-wings, whose winds are hurled Whither thy Ghost tempestuous can see A desolate apocalypse of death.

Oh, how thou dost drive silence from the world, With emerald overflowing, waste on waste Of flas.h.i.+ng susurration, dashed and swirled O'er isles and continents that shrink abased!

Nay, frustrate Hope art thou, of the Unknown, Gathered from primal mist and firmament; A surging shape of Life's unfathomed moan, Whelming humanity with fears unmeant.

Yet do I love thee, O, above all fear, And loving thee unconquerably trust The runes that from thy ageless surfing start Would read, were they revealed, gust upon gust, That Immortality is might of heart!

THE DAY-MOON

So wan, so unavailing, Across the vacant day-blue dimly trailing!

Last night, sphered in thy s.h.i.+ning, A Circe--mystic destinies divining;

To-day but as a feather Torn from a seraph's wing in sinful weather,

Down-drifting from the portals Of Paradise, unto the land of mortals.

Yet do I feel thee awing My heart with mystery, as thy updrawing

Moves thro' the tides of Ocean And leaves lorn beaches barren of its motion;

Or strands upon near shallows The wreck whose weirded form at night unhallows

The fisher maiden's prayers-- ”For _him_!--that storms may take not unawares!”

So wan, so unavailing, Across the vacant day-blue dimly trailing!

But Night shall come atoning Thy phantom life thro' day, and high enthroning

Thee in her chambers arrased With star-hieroglyphs, leave thee unhara.s.sed

To glide with silvery pa.s.sion, Till in earth's shadow swept thy glowings ashen.

A SEA-GHOST

Oh, fisher-fleet, go in from the sea And furl your wings.

The bay is gray with the twilit spray And the loud surf springs.

The chill buoy-bell is rung by the hands Of all the drowned, Who know the woe of the wind and tow Of the tides around.

Go in, go in! Oh, haste from the sea, And let them rest-- A son and one who was wed and one Who went down unblest.