Part 13 (1/2)

WASTE

I flung a wild rose into the sea, I know not why.

For swinging there on a rathe rose-tree, By the scented bay and barberry, Its petals gave all their sweet to me, As I pa.s.sed by.

And yet I flung it into the tide, And went my way.

I climbed the gray rocks, far and wide, And many a cove of peace I tried, With none of them all to be satisfied, The whole long day.

For I had wasted a beautiful thing, Which might have won Each pa.s.sing heart to pause and sing, On the sea-path there, of its blossoming.

And who wastes beauty shall feel want's sting, As I had done.

RESURGENCE

I was content, O Sea, to be free for a s.p.a.ce from striving, Content as the brown weed is, at rest on rocks in the sun, When the salt tide is out, and the surf no more is riving At its roots, or swirling and bidding it sway where the white waves run.

I was content--with life, and love, and a little over; A little achieved of the much that is given to men to do.

But now with your tidal strife do you come again, vain rover, And tell of vast.i.tudes, to be sailed, or sounded, anew.

Now again do you surge. And the fathomless tides of thinking, Of wanting, waiting, despairing--or daring--with you come; The inner tides of the soul, that had ebbed with slumberous shrinking, But now are bursting again, thro the caves of it long numb.

So vainly I lie on the cliff with the blissful Blue above me And listless sated gulls afloat below on the swells, For I am soothless, sateless, because of desires that shove me Out and away with the winds, on quests no distance quells!

LIFE'S ANSWER

A stroke of lightning stabbed the storm-black sea, As if it sought the heart of Life thereunder, And meant to put an end to it utterly;-- Then came thunder-- Wildly applauding thunder.

Riven with fear the foam-crests ran before it, Hissed by the rain and beaten down to darkness.

A gull rose out of the murk with wings that tore it-- Life's answer to the storm's terrible starkness.

AS THE TIDE COMES IN

The quivering terns dart wild and dive, As the tide comes tumbling in.

The calm rock-pools grow all alive, With the tide tumbling in.

The crab who under the brown weed creeps, And the snail who lies in his house and sleeps, Awake and stir, as the plunging sweeps Of the tide come tumbling in.

Gray driftwood swishes along the sand, As the tide comes tumbling in.