Chapter 3
It is the old old murmur, The sea's sound and your voice. God in his Bliss between them Could make no choice. For all the world's deep music In you I hear: Nor shall I ask death, ever, For aught more dear.
II
LOVE AND INFINITY
Across the kindling twilight moon A late gull wings to rest. The sea is murmuring underneath Its vast eternal quest. The coast-light flashes over the tide A red and warning eye, And oh the world is very wide, But you are nigh!
The stars come out from zone to zone, The wind knows every one And blows their message to my heart, As it has ever done. "They are all God's," it tells me, "all, However huge or high." But ah I could not trust its call-- Were you not by!
III
RECOMPENSE
Not if I chose from a world of days Could I find a day like this. The sky is a wreath of azure haze And the sea an azure bliss. The surf runs racing the young salt wind, Shouting without a fear Over reef, bar, cliff and scaur, Where you and I lie near.
O you and I who have watched the sky And sea from many a shore! You, love, and I who will live and die-- And watch the sea no more! O joy of the world! Joy of love, Joy that can say to death, "Tho you end all with your wanton pall, We two have had this breath!"
IV
AT THE EBB-HOUR
As I hear, thro the midnight sighing, The low ebb-tide withdrawn, And gulls on the dark cliff crying For far discernless dawn, It seems that all life is lying Within your every breath, Yet I can not believe in dying, Or death.
As I hear, from the gray church tower, The bell's unfailing sound Peal forth hour after hour To night's lone reaches round, It seems as if Time's wan power Would sear all things apace-- All, save in my heart one flower, Your face.
V
IN A DARK HOUR
You are not with me--only the moon, The sea and the gulls' cry, out of tune; The myriad cry of the gulls still strewn On the sands where the tide will enter soon.
You are not with me, only the breath Of the wind--and then the wind's death. A shrouding silence then that saith, "Even as wind love vanisheth."
You are not with me--only fear, As old as earth's first frenzied bier That severed two whose hearts were near, And left one with all Life unclear.
VI
VIA AMOROSA
When we two walk, my love, on the path The moon makes over the sea, To the end of the world where sorrow hath An end that is ecstasy, Should we not think of the other road Of wearying dust and stone Our feet would fare did each but care To follow the way alone?
When we two slip at night to the skies And find one star that we keep As a trysting-place to which our eyes May lead our souls ere sleep, Should we not pause for a little space And think how many must sigh Because they gaze over starry ways With no heart-comrade by?
When we two then lie down to our dreams That deepen still the delight Of our wandering where stars and streams Stray in immortal light, Should we not grieve with the myriads From East of earth to West Who lay them down at night but to drown A longing for some loved breast?
Ah, yes, for life has a thousand gifts, But love it is gives life. Who walks thro his world in loneness lifts A soul that is sorrow-rife. But they to whom it is given to tread The moon-path and not sink Can ever say the unhappiest way Earth has is fair, to the brink.
VII
TRANSFUSION
A shoal-light flashes east, And livid lightning west, The silvery dark night-sea between, On which we ride at rest, And gaze far, far away Into the fretless skies, World-sadness in our thought--but ah, Content within our eyes.
The ship's bell strikes--the sound Floats shrouded to our ears, Then suddenly, as at a touch, The universe appears A Presence Infinite That penetrates our love And makes us one with night and sea And all the stars above.
NEED OF STORM
(_Naples-on-the-Gulf_)
On the green floor of the Gulf the wind is walking, Printing it with invisible feet; The tide is talking.
Purple and grey the horizon walls them round With purpler clouds. They wander in it like guests gently astray In a house deep mystery shrouds.
I do not know the speech of the tide, For too articulate have become my years: Beauty brings only words, not breathless tears.
So the young heron fishing there in the foam On the sand's edge, Would once have taken my spirit far, far home To the infinite, when he vanished thro the gloam.
But now I am left behind on the beach--a shell That no more knows the wonder of the sea's swell, Or more than the empty echo of its knell.
To sea then, Life, wildly to sea with a storm Sweep me again, From the smooth dull beach of custom where I lie, That I may feel once more The swaying surge of passion thro me swarm!
A FLORIDA INTERLUDE
(_Naples-on-the-Gulf_)
I
Behind me lie the Everglades, The mystic grassy Everglades, Where the moccasin and the Seminole glide In secret silent Indian ways. Before me lies the Gulf, The cup of blue bright tropic waters, Held to the parched lips of the South To cool and quench its thirst.
Behind me lie the Everglades, Before me lies the Gulf, Which the sunset soon shall change to wine, A Eucharist for the longing soul. Its rim of land shall be transformed To Mexic opal and chrysoprase, And then shall come the moon As calm as a thought of Christ.
As calm as a thought of Christ-- Over the cup's sand-rim enchased With palm and pine, Floridian friends, Saying their twilight litanies; While homeward flies the heron To his island cypress in the swamp, Which Spanish mosses drape and the moon Silverly soothes to peace.
II
Behind me lie the Everglades, Where the bittern wails to the moon's face. Peace is gone as I wake And memory in me wails From the primal swamp, Heredity, Whence I have come with all the desires Of creeping, walking, flying things, To creep or walk or fly.
With all the desires of the earth-creatures; Yet with a want transcendent, A want that comes with the glimmer of stars And pierces to my heart. A want of the life I have not known, Of the life unknowable, In the Everglades of the Universe Where the Great Spirit glides.
A FLORIDA BOATING SONG
Down thro Florida keys, From island, to island! Down thro Florida keys, Where mangrove roots dip in the seas! A myriad tangled roots From each palmetto byland, Oyster-encrusted roots mid which The heron wades in the shallow shades!
Down thro Florida keys, Around them, between them, Thro low green Florida keys, So low they scarce seem born of the seas! Where pouchy pelicans roost On cypresses that lean them Out over the idle lap of the tide That comes and goes with balmy flows!
Down thro Florida keys, Thro mazes on mazes Of ripple-encircled keys, Where sun and wind play as they please! Where the eaglet, high in air, Or the wild white ibis, dazes Eyes that follow them up the blue, As the heart would do, the heart too!
Down thro Florida keys I'm going, I'm going! Thro low green Florida keys And greener glades of Florida seas! And this is all I know, That all in the world worth knowing Is joy like that of the tarpon's leap In air divine with the warm sunshine!
DAWN-BLISS
(_Naples-on-the-Gulf_)
I went out at dawn, Pelicans were fishing, Big-beaked, grey and brown; Little waves were swishing. Clouds creamed the sky, As shells creamed the shore; Wild aery hues of beauty Round seemed to pour!
I went out at dawn, Pelicans were floating, Big beaks on their breasts; Up the sun came boating. "Ship ahoy!" I cried, To his golden sail. Bliss-winds of beauty in me Broke--to a gale!
I went out at dawn, Pelicans were winging. Palms waved passion plumes, Beach sands were singing. Stripped, save of strength, I plunged into the sea And swam, till the bliss of beauty Died away in me.
ATAVISM
I leant out over a ledging cliff and looked down into the sea, Where weed and kelp and dulse swayed, in green translucency; Where the abalone clung to the rock and the star-fish lay about, Purpling the sands that slid away under the silver trout.
And the sea-urchin too was there, and the sea-anemone. It was a world of watery shapes and hues and wizardry. And I felt old stirrings wake in me, under the tides of time, Sea-hauntings I had brought with me out of the ancient slime.
And now, as I muse, I cannot rid my senses of the spell That in a tidal trance all things around me drift and swell Under the sea of the Universe, down into which strange eyes Keep peering at me, as I peered, with wonder and surmise.
RE-RECKONING
Two years have gone, and again I stand On the bow of a mighty ship That pushes her way 'twixt sea and stars With soft and dreamy dip. Two years of labouring, heart and hand, Of waging spirit-wars, Of wondering ever what life is-- And if death heals its scars.
Two years; and again the mast-bell sounds Above me--with a low voice, As ghostly as the white phosphor-foam That breaks with the old noise Of waters that have washed all bounds Of earth, that is man's home-- His ark--on the wide ether flung, Unrestingly to roam.
For, even as we, is this our earth An endless wanderer Far down a universe with vast Strange voyagings astir; And where time ever brings to birth A craving, never past, To fare from where we are, to where No anchor ever was cast.
A craving--in the mote, the man, The mollusc and the star; A yearning on--O life! O life! How far leads it, how far? All unbelievably began Our voyage, mid a strange strife-- That, meaningless, yet seems to mean It is with Wisdom rife.
But if it is not, shall we say, "Let man scuttle his ship, And drown in universal death The griefs that at him grip?" No; for no surety rests therein To certain end of breath. He can but let hope set the course His soul foretokeneth.
TO THE AFTERNOON MOON, AT SEA
Take care, O wisp of a moon, Vague on the sunny blue above the sea, Or the gull flying across you Will pierce your veil-thin shape with a sharp wing!
Take care, or the wind will wilt you, As he does the clouds snowily drifting by you, And diffuse you over the sky, a silvery mist, To give more cool to the day!
Take care, so near the horizon, Or a phantom skipper, one who has long been drowned, Will reach above it and seize you And make you his sail to circle the world forever!
Take care, take care! for frailty Is the prey of the strong, and you, a wraith of it, Have yet a long while to go before nightfall Brings you to sure effulgence!
PATHS
Crushing in my hand The bay as I pass, Drinking in its fragrance With the sea's scent, While gull-wings write Poems white and fast On the blue sky That is soft with content; Crushing in my hand The bay and the juniper, While I record Each line the gulls write, I go by sea paths Down to the sea's edge, I go by heart paths Deep into delight.
Simple is my joy As the little sandpiper's, Who follows beside me With silvery song; Blither than the breeze, That skims great billows Nor knows how deep Is their flow--or strong. Simple is my joy, A sunny sense-sweetness, Full of bird-bliss, Bay-warmth, spray-leap. Mysteries there are And miseries beneath it, But sunk, like wrecks, Far down in the deep.
FROM A NORTHERN BEACH
Is it because for a million years The tide has entered here From cold north seas Where ice-floes freeze That ever unto my ear Primordial loneness in its voice Comes telling of that time When life was not, upon the earth, But only glacier-rime?
Is it because these granite rocks I share with weed and scurf Were held so long By the ice-throng That now they take the surf So selflessly and soullessly, As if God's Immanence Had been pressed from them, never more To enter, with sweet sense?
And is it because I, too, evolved From ice and sea and shore, Can understand How life has spanned The lifeless ages o'er, That as I sit here, suddenly The tide again seems stilled And earth beneath a great white pall Again lies changed and chilled?
So it must be--ah, so; for soft Within my muted brain The heritage Of age on age Reverberates again. Wherefore when glacial Silence comes With Death shall I emerge From that as from the frozen Past, Under Life's endless urge?
PASSAGE
A dark sail, Like a wild-goose wing, Where the sunset was. The moon soon will silver its sinewy flight Thro the night watches, And the far flight Of those immortal migrants, The ever-returning stars.
ALEEN
The long line of the foaming coast Is muffled by the fog's gray ghost. I cross the league of sea between And lift the latch and kiss Aleen.
She throws a log upon the fire. I draw her to me, nigh and nigher. She does not know what a brief time Ago it was my arms held--crime.
The surf is beating on the shore. We hear our own heart-beatings more. She speaks of _him_ and my reply Is silence: does she wonder why?
"I do not love him: have no fear," Her whisper is, against my ear. At last, "I have no fear," say I. She starts, as at a wild-beast's cry.
And then she sees red on my coat. A still-born cry throbs in her throat. The fog sweeps by the window pane. Her sight is fixed on one dull stain.
I rise and light my pipe and go, Leaving her standing, staring so. The wind means storm, I think, to-night: But more than that will make her white.
And yet had it been yesterday She said those words, I still could pray. There would be still a God above-- For two, now overwhelmed, to love!
TO A SOLITARY SEA-GULL
Lone white gull with sickle wings, You reap for the heart inscrutable things: Sorrow of mists and surf of the shore, Winds that sigh of the nevermore; Fret of foam and flurry of rain, Swept far over the troubled tide; Maths of mystery and grey pain The sea's voice ever yields, beside. Lone white gull, you reap for the heart Life's most sad and inscrutable part.
INEFFABLE THINGS
The little song-sparrow is gone And the summer is nearly ended, The rill of his song was a happy rift In the surging sound of the sea. The swallow is lingering on, And the silvery swift sandpiper, And I--tho I know my saddened heart Has lost an ineffable thing, That summer no more can bring.
With the first bay-leaves that flung Their scent to me by the billows, I twined some faith, some trust, As glad as the sparrow's song. And the terns that darted among The tides seemed weaving for me Impalpable wings of peace and hope-- That now have taken flight Beyond the day and the night.
Ah, Life, you have known my plea For sun and the tide of fortune, For winds to waken my sail and bear Me joyously over the world. Know too how much of your fog And storm and rain I will suffer, If only you do not sweep from me The dear ineffable things, To which your fragrance clings.
THE SONG OF A SEA-FARER
Many are on the sea to-day With all sails set. The tide rolls in a restive gray, The wind blows wet. The gull is weary of his wings, And I am weary of all things.
Heavy upon me longing lies, My sad eyes gaze Across sad leagues that sink and rise And sink always. My life has sunk and risen so, I'd have it cease awhile to flow.
WAVES
The evening sails come home With twilight in their wings. The harbour-light across the gloam Springs; The wind sings.
The waves begin to tell The sea's night-sorrow o'er, Weaving within their ancient spell More Than earth's lore.
The rising moon wafts strange Low lures across the tide, On which my dim thoughts seem to range, Stride Upon stride,
Until, with flooding thrill, They seem at last to blend With waves that from the Eternal Will Wend, Without end.
IN A STORM
(_To a Petrel_)
All day long in the spindrift swinging, Bird of the sea! bird of the sea! How I would that I had thy winging-- How I envy thee!
How I would that I had thy spirit, So to careen, joyous to cry, Over the storm and never fear it! Into the night that hovers near it! Calm on a reeling sky!
All day long, and the night, unresting! Ah! I believe thy every breath Means that life's best comes ever breasting Peril and pain and death!
AFTER THEIR PARTING
(_A Woman Speaks_)
You know that rock on a rocky coast, Where the moon came up, a ruined ghost, Distorted until her shape almost Seemed breaking? Came up like a phantom silently And dropped her shroud on the red night sea, Then walked, a spectral mystery, Unwaking?
You know how, sudden, there came a change, When she had left the sea's low range, Its lurid crimson, stark and strange, Behind her? How, sudden, her silver self shone thro, Tranquilly free of the earth's stained hue, And found a way where the clouds were few To bind her?
You know this? Then go back some day, When I have gone the moonless way, To that dark rock whereon we lay And waited; And when the moon has arisen free, Your soiling doubt shall fall from me, And eased of unrest your heart shall be, And sated.
A WORD'S MAGIC
Do you remember Etajima, And how, upon a moon-fogged sea, As ghostly as ever a tide shall be, We passed an island silently?
And how a low voice in the gloom Of the temple pine-trees leaning there Said _sayonara_ to one somewhere Unseen in the shadow-haunted air?
Just _sayonara_: but it seemed The soul of all farewells that night, The sigh of all withdrawn delight, The sound of love's last rapture-rite.
And now, after long years, it comes Again from isles of memory To bring once more to birth in me The breath of all lost witchery.
Yes, one low word of parting, now Echoing, thro the fog of years, Has touched my heart with beauty's tears, And youth thro all things reappears.
SEA RHAPSODY
(_Out of Hong-kong_)
Never again, never again Did I hope to breathe such joy! The sea is blue and the winds halloo Up to the sun "Ahoy!" "Ahoy!" they shout and the mists they rout From the mountain-tops go streaming In happy play where the gulls sway, And a million waves are gleaming!
And every wave, billowing brave, Is tipped with a wild delight. A garden of isles around me smiles, Bathed in the blue noon light, The rude brown bunk of the fishing junk Seems fair as a sea-king's palace: O wine of the sky the gods have spilt Out of its crystal chalice!
For wine is the wind, wine the sea, Wine for the sinking spirit, To lift it up from the cling of clay Into high Bliss--or near it! So let me drink till I cease to think, And know with a sting of rapture That joy is yet as wide as the world For men, at last, to capture!
IN AN ORIENTAL HARBOUR
All the ships of the world come here, Rest a little, then set to sea; Some ride up to the waiting pier, Some drop anchor beyond the quay. Some have funnels of blue and black, (Some come once but come not back!) Some have funnels of red and yellow, Some--O war!--have funnels of gray.
All the ships of the world come here, Ships from every billow's foam; Fruiter and oiler, pirateer, Liner and lugger and tramp a-roam. Some are scented of palm and pine, (Some are fain for the Pole's far clime). Some are scented of soy and senna, Some--ah me!--are scented of home.
All the ships of the world come here, Day and night there is sound of bells, Seeking the port they calmly steer, Clearing the port they ring farewells. Under the sun or under the stars (Under the light of swaying spars), Under the moon or under morning Do they swing, as the tide swells.
All the ships of the world come here, Rest a little and then are gone, Over the crystal planet-sphere Swept, thro every season, on. Swept to every cape and isle (Every coast of cloud or smile), Swept till over them sweeps the sorrow Of their last sea-dawn.
UNDER THE SKY
Far out to sea go the fishing junks, With all sails set, The tide swings gray and the clouds sway, The wind blows wet; Blows wet from the long coast lying dim As if mist-born. Far out they sail, as the stars pale, The stars of morn.
Far out to sea go the fishing junks, And I who pass Upon a deck that is vaster reck No more, alas, Of all their life, or they of mine, Than comes to this,-- That under the sky we live and die, Like all that is.
A SONG FOR HEALING
(_On the South Seas_)
When I return to the world again, The world of fret and fight, To grapple with godless things and men, In battle, wrong or right, I will remember this--the sea, And the white stars hanging high, And the vessel's bow Where calmly now I gaze to the boundless sky.
When I am deaf with the din of strife, And blind amid despair, When I am choked with the dust of life And long for free soul-air, I will recall this sound--the sea's, And the wide horizon's hope, And the wind that blows And the phosphor snows That fall as the cleft waves ope.
When I am beaten--when I fall On the bed of black defeat, When I have hungered, and in gall Have got but shame to eat, I will remember this--the sea, And its tide as soft as sleep, And the clear night sky That heals for aye All who will trust its Deep.
A SINGHALESE LOVE LAMENT
As the cocoanut-palm That pines, my love, Away from the sound Of the planter's voice, Am I, for I hear No more resound Your song by the pearl-strewn sea! The sun may come And the moon wax round, And in its beam My mates may rejoice, But I feast not And my heart is dumb, As I long, O long, for thee!
In the jungle-deeps, Where the cobra creeps, The leopard lies In wait for me, But O, my love, When the daylight dies There is more to my dread than he! Harsh lonely tears That assail my eyes Are worse to bear,-- For the misery That makes them well Is the long, long years That I moan away from thee!