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The following sections, if they exist, are offprint from Beacham's Guide to Literature for Young Adults: "About the Author", "Overview", "Setting", "Literary Qualities", "Social Sensitivity", "Topics for Discussion", "Ideas for Reports and Papers". (c)1994-2005, by Walton Beacham.
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Table of Contents | |
Section | Page |
Start of eBook | 1 |
THE GRAVEDIGGER | 1 |
THE MARRING OF MALYN | 4 |
I | 4 |
II | 5 |
III | 7 |
THE NANCY’S PRIDE | 8 |
THE SHIPS OF ST. JOHN | 10 |
THE KELPIE RIDERS | 13 |
I | 13 |
II | 14 |
III | 15 |
IV | 17 |
V | 18 |
LEGENDS OF LOST HAVEN | 19 |
THE MASTER OF THE ISLES | 21 |
OUTBOUND | 23 |
Oh, the shambling sea is a
sexton old,
And well his work is done.
With an equal grave for lord
and knave,
He buries them every one.
Then hoy and rip, with a rolling
hip,
He makes for the nearest shore;
And God, who sent him a thousand
ship,
Will send him a thousand more;
But some he’ll save
for a bleaching grave,
And shoulder them in to shore,—
Shoulder them in, shoulder
them in,
Shoulder them in to shore.
Oh, the ships of Greece and
the ships of Tyre
Went out, and where are they?
In the port they made, they
are delayed
With the ships of yesterday.
He followed the ships of England
far,
As the ships of long ago;
And the ships of France they
led him a dance,
But he laid them all arow.
Oh, a loafing, idle lubber
to him
Is the sexton of the town;
For sure and swift, with a
guiding lift,
He shovels the dead men down.
But though he delves so fierce
and grim,
His honest graves are wide,
As well they know who sleep
below
The dredge of the deepest
tide.
Oh, he works with a rollicking
stave at lip,
And loud is the chorus skirled;
With the burly rote of his
rumbling throat
He batters it down the world.
He learned it once in his
father’s house,
Where the ballads of eld were
sung;
And merry enough is the burden
rough,
But no man knows the tongue.
Oh, fair, they say, was his
bride to see,
And wilful she must have been,
That she could bide at his
gruesome side
When the first red dawn came
in.
And sweet, they say, is her
kiss to those
She greets to his border home;
And softer than sleep her
hand’s first sweep
That beckons, and they come.
Oh, crooked is he, but strong
enough
To handle the tallest mast;
From the royal barque to the
slaver dark,
He buries them all at last.
Then hoy and rip, with a rolling
hip,
He makes for the nearest shore;
And God, who sent him a thousand
ship,
Will send him a thousand more;
But some he’ll save
for a bleaching grave,
And shoulder them in to shore,—
Shoulder them in, shoulder
them in,
Shoulder them in to shore.
THE YULE GUEST
And Yanna by the yule log
Sat in the empty hall,
And watched the goblin firelight
Caper upon the wall:
The goblins of the hearthstone,
Who teach the wind to sing,
Who dance the frozen yule
away
And usher back the spring;
The goblins of the Northland,
Who teach the gulls to scream,
Who dance the autumn into
dust,
The ages into dream.
Like the tall corn was Yanna,
Bending and smooth and fair,—
His Yanna of the sea-gray
eyes
And harvest-yellow hair.
Child of the low-voiced people
Who dwell among the hills,
She had the lonely calm and
poise
Of life that waits and wills.
Only to-night a little
With grave regard she smiled,
Remembering the morn she woke
And ceased to be a child.
Outside, the ghostly rampikes,
Those armies of the moon,
Stood while the ranks of stars
drew on
To that more spacious noon,—
While over them in silence
Waved on the dusk afar
The gold flags of the Northern
light
Streaming with ancient war.
And when below the headland
The riders of the foam
Up from the misty border rode
The wild gray horses home,
And woke the wintry mountains
With thunder on the shore,
Out of the night there came
a weird
And cried at Yanna’s
door.
“O Yanna, Adrianna,
They buried me away
In the blue fathoms of the
deep,
Beyond the outer bay.
“But in the yule, O
Yanna,
Up from the round dim sea
And reeling dungeons of the
fog,
I am come back to thee!”
The wind slept in the forest,
The moon was white and high,
Only the shifting snow awoke
To hear the yule guest cry.
“O Yanna, Yanna, Yanna,
Be quick and let me in!
For bitter is the trackless
way
And far that I have been!”
Then Yanna by the yule log
Starts from her dream to hear
A voice that bids her brooding
heart
Shudder with joy and fear.
The wind is up a moment
And whistles at the eaves,
And in his troubled iron dream
The ocean moans and heaves.
She trembles at the door-lock
That he is come again,
And frees the wooden bolt
for one
No barrier could detain.
“O Garvin, bonny Garvin,
So late, so late you come!”
The yule log crumbles down
and throws
Strange figures on the gloom;
But in the moonlight pouring
Through the half-open door
Stands the gray guest of yule
and casts
No shadow on the floor.
The change that is upon him
She knows not in her haste;
About him her strong arms
with glad
Impetuous tears are laced.
She’s led him to the
fireside,
And set the wide oak chair,
And with her warm hands brushed
away
The sea-rime from his hair.
“O Garvin, I have waited,—
Have watched the red sun sink,
And clouds of sail come flocking
in
Over the world’s gray
brink,
“With stories of encounter
On plank and mast and spar;
But never the brave barque
I launched
And waved across the bar.
“How come you so unsignalled,
When I have watched so well?
Where rides the Adrianna
With my name on boat and bell?”
“O Yanna, golden Yanna,
The Adrianna lies
With the sea dredging through
her ports,
The white sand through her
eyes.
“And strange unearthly
creatures
Make marvel of her hull,
Where far below the gulfs
of storm
There is eternal lull.
“O Yanna, Adrianna,
This midnight I am here,
Because one night of all my
life
At yule tide of the year,
“With the stars white
in heaven,
And peace upon the sea,
With all my world in your
white arms
You gave yourself to me.
“For that one night,
my Yanna,
Within the dying year,
Was it not well to love, and
now
Can it be well to fear?”
“O Garvin, there is
heartache
In tales that are half told;
But ah, thy cheek is pale
to-night,
And thy poor hands are cold!
“Tell me the course,
the voyage,
The ports, and the new stars;
Did the long rollers make
green surf
On the white reefs and bars?”
“O Yanna, Adrianna,
Though easily I found
The set of those uncharted
tides
In seas no line could sound,
“And made without a pilot
The port without a light,
No log keeps tally of the knots
That I have sailed to-night.
“It fell about mid-April;
The Trades were holding free;
We drove her till the scuppers hissed
And buried in the lee.
* * * * *
“O Yanna, Adrianna,
Loose hands and let me go!
The night grows red along the East,
And in the shifting snow
“I hear my shipmates calling,
Sent out to search for me
In the pale lands beneath the moon
Along the troubling sea.”
“O Garvin, bonny Garvin,
What is the booming sound
Of canvas, and the piping
shrill,
As when a ship comes round?”
“It is the shadow boatswain
Piping his hands to bend
The looming sails on giant
yards
Aboard the Nomansfriend.
“She sails for Sunken
Harbor
And ports of yester year;
The tern are shrilling in
the lift,
The low wind-gates are clear.
“O Yanna, Adrianna,
The little while is done.
Thou wilt behold the brightening
sea
Freshen before the sun,
“And many a morning
redden
The dark hill slopes of pine;
But I must sail hull-down
to-night
Below the gray sea-line.
“I shall not hear the snowbirds
Their morning litany,
For when the dawn comes over dale
I must put out to sea.”
“O Garvin, bonny Garvin,
To have thee as I will,
I would that never more on earth
The dawn came over hill.”
* * * * *
Then on the snowy pillow,
Her hair about her face,
He laid her in the quiet room,
And wiped away all trace
Of tears from the poor eyelids
That were so sad for him,
And soothed her into sleep at last
As the great stars grew dim.
Tender as April twilight
He sang, and the song grew
Vague as the dreams which
roam about
This world of dust and dew:
“O Yanna, Adrianna,
Dear Love, look forth to sea
And all year long until the
yule,
Dear Heart, keep watch for
me!
“O Yanna, Adrianna,
I hear the calling sea,
And the folk telling tales
among
The hills where I would be.
“O Yanna, Adrianna,
Over the hills of sea
The wind calls and the morning
comes,
And I must forth from thee.
“But Yanna, Adrianna,
Keep watch above the sea;
And when the weary time is
o’er,
Dear Life, come back to me!”
“O Garvin, bonny Garvin—”
She murmurs in her dream,
And smiles a moment in her
sleep
To hear the white gulls scream.
Then with the storm foreboding
Far in the dim gray South,
He kissed her not upon the
cheek
Nor on the burning mouth,
But once above the forehead
Before he turned away;
And ere the morning light
stole in,
That golden lock was gray.
“O Yanna, Adrianna—”
The wind moans to the sea;
And down the sluices of the
dawn
A shadow drifts alee.
THE MERRYMAKERS
Among the wintry mountains
beside the Northern sea
There is a merrymaking, as
old as old can be.
Over the river reaches, over
the wastes of snow,
Halting at every doorway,
the white drifts come and go.
They scour upon the open,
and mass along the wood,
The burliest invaders that
ever man withstood.
With swoop and whirl and scurry,
these riders of the drift
Will mount and wheel and column,
and pass into the lift.
All night upon the marshes
you hear their tread go by,
And all night long the streamers
are dancing on the sky.
Their light in Malyn’s
chamber is pale upon the floor,
And Malyn of the mountains
is theirs for evermore.
She fancies them a people
in saffron and in green,
Dancing for her. For
Malyn is only seventeen.
Out there beyond her window,
from frosty deep to deep,
Her heart is dancing with
them until she falls asleep.
Then all night long through
heaven, with stately to and fro,
To music of no measure, the
gorgeous dancers go.
The stars are great and splendid,
beryl and gold and blue,
And there are dreams for Malyn
that never will come true.
Yet for one golden Yule-tide
their royal guest is she,
Among the wintry mountains
beside the Northern sea.
A SAILOR’S WEDDING
There is a Norland laddie
who sails the round sea-rim,
And Malyn of the mountains
is all the world to him.
The Master of the Snowflake,
bound upward from the line,
He smothers her with canvas
along the crumbling brine.
He crowds her till she buries
and shudders from his hand,
For in the angry sunset the
watch has sighted land;
And he will brook no gainsay
who goes to meet his bride.
But their will is the wind’s
will who traffic on the tide.
Make home, my bonny schooner!
The sun goes down to light
The gusty crimson wind-halls
against the wedding night.
She gathers up the distance,
and grows and veers and swings,
Like any homing swallow with
nightfall in her wings.
The wind’s white sources
glimmer with shining gusts of rain;
And in the Ardise country
the spring comes back again.
It is the brooding April,
haunted and sad and dear,
When vanished things return
not with the returning year.
Only, when evening purples
the light in Malyn’s dale,
With sound of brooks and robins,
by many a hidden trail,
With stir of lulling rivers
along the forest floor,
The dream-folk of the gloaming
come back to Malyn’s door.
The dusk is long and gracious,
and far up in the sky
You hear the chimney-swallows
twitter and scurry by.
The hyacinths are lonesome
and white in Malyn’s room;
And out at sea the Snowflake
is driving through the gloom.
The whitecaps froth and freshen;
in squadrons of white surge
They thunder on to ruin, and
smoke along the verge.
The lift is black above them,
the sea is mirk below,
And down the world’s
wide border they perish as they go.
They comb and seethe and founder,
they mount and glimmer and flee,
Amid the awful sobbing and
quailing of the sea.
They sheet the flying schooner
in foam from stem to stern,
Till every yard of canvas
is drenched from clew to ear’n’.
And where they move uneasy,
chill is the light and pale;
They are the Skipper’s
daughters, who dance before the gale.
They revel with the Snowflake,
and down the close of day
Among the boisterous dancers
she holds her dancing way;
And then the dark has kindled
the harbor light alee,
With stars and wind and sea-room
upon the gurly sea.
The storm gets up to windward
Ah, Malyn, lay your forehead
upon your folded arm,
And hear the grim marauder
shake out the reefs of storm!
Loud laughs the surly Skipper
to feel the fog drive in,
Because a blue-eyed sailor
shall wed his kith and kin,
And the red dawn discover
a rover spent for breath
Among the merrymakers who
fondle him to death.
And all the snowy sisters
are dancing wild and grand,
For him whose broken beauty
shall slacken to their hand.
They wanton in their triumph,
and skirl at Malyn’s plight;
Lift up their hands in chorus,
and thunder to the night.
The gulls are driven inland;
but on the dancing tide
The master of the Snowflake
is taken to his bride.
And there when daybreak yellows
along the far sea-plain,
The fresh and buoyant morning
comes down the wind again.
The world is glad of April,
the gulls are wild with glee,
And Malyn on the headland
alone looks out to sea.
Once more that gray Shipmaster
smiles, for the night is done,
And all his snow-white daughters
are dancing in the sun.
THE LIGHT ON THE MARSH
The year grows on to harvest,
the tawny lilies burn
Along the marsh, and hillward
the roads are sweet with fern.
All day the windless heaven
pavilions the sea-blue,
Then twilight comes and drenches
the sultry dells with dew.
The lone white star of evening
comes out among the hills,
And in the darkling forest
begin the whip-poor-wills.
The fireflies that wander,
the hawks that flit and scream,
And all the wilding vagrants
of summer dusk and dream,
Have all their will, and reck
not of any after thing,
Inheriting no sorrow and no
foreshadowing.
The wind forgets to whisper,
the pines forget to moan,
And Malyn of the mountains
is there among her own.
Malyn, whom grief nor wonder
can trouble nevermore,
Since that spring night the
Snowflake was wrecked beside her door,
And strange her cry went seaward
once, and her soul thereon
With the vast lonely sea-winds,
a wanderer, was gone.
But she, that patient beauty
which is her body fair,
Endures on earth still lovely,
untenanted of care.
The folk down at the harbor
pity from day to day;
With a “God save you,
Malyn!” they bid her on her way.
She smiles, poor feckless
Malyn, the knowing smile of those
Whom the too sudden vision
God sometimes may disclose
Of his wild, lurid world-wreck,
has blinded with its sheen.
Then, with a fond insistence,
pathetic and serene,
They pass among their fellows
for lost minds none can save,
Bent on their single business,
and marvel why men rave.
Now far away a sighing comes
from the buried reef,
As though the sea were mourning
above an ancient grief.
For once the restless Mother
of all the weary lands
Went down to him in beauty,
with trouble in her hands,
And gave to him forever all
memory to keep,
But to her wayward children
oblivion and sleep,
That no immortal burden might
plague one living thing,
But death should sweetly visit
us vagabonds of spring.
And so his heart forever goes
inland with the tide,
Searching with many voices
among the marshes wide.
Under the quiet starlight,
up through the stirring reeds,
With whispering and lamenting
it rises and recedes.
All night the lapsing rivers
croon to their shingly bars
The wizardries that mingle
the sea-wind and the stars.
And all night long wherever
the moving waters gleam,
The little hills hearken,
hearken, the great hills hear and dream.
And Malyn keeps the marshes
all the sweet summer night,
Alone, foot-free, to follow
a wandering wisp-light.
For every day at sundown,
at the first beacon’s gleam,
She calls the gulls her brothers
and keeps a tryst with them.
On the long slow heave of
a lazy sea,
To the flap of an idle sail,
The Nancy’s Pride went
out on the tide;
And the skipper stood by the
rail.
All down, all down by the
sleepy town,
With the hollyhocks a-row
In the little poppy gardens,
The sea had her in tow.
They let her slip by the breathing
rip,
Where the bell is never still,
And over the sounding harbor
bar,
And under the harbor hill.
She melted into the dreaming
noon,
Out of the drowsy land,
In sight of a flag of goldy
hair,
To the kiss of a girlish hand.
For the lass who hailed the
lad who sailed,
Was—who but his
April bride?
And of all the fleet of Grand
Latite,
Her pride was the Nancy’s
Pride.
So the little vessel faded
down
With her creaking boom a-swing,
Till a wind from the deep
came up with a creep,
And caught her wing and wing.
She made for the lost horizon
line,
Where the clouds a-castled
lay,
While the boil and seethe
of the open sea
Hung on her frothing way.
She lifted her hull like a
breasting gull
Where the rolling valleys
be,
And dipped where the shining
porpoises
Put ploughshares through the
sea.
A fading sail on the far sea-line,
About the turn of the tide,
As she made for the Banks
on her maiden cruise,
Was the last of the Nancy’s
Pride.
To-day a boy with goldy hair,
In a garden of Grand Latite,
From his mother’s knee
looks out to sea
For the coming of the fleet.
They all may home on a sleepy
tide,
To the flap of the idle sail;
But it’s never again
the Nancy’s Pride
That answers a human hail.
They all may home on a sleepy
tide
To the sag of an idle sheet;
But it’s never again
the Nancy’s Pride
That draws men down the street.
On the Banks to-night a fearsome
sight
The fishermen behold,
Keeping the ghost watch in
the moon
When the small hours are cold.
When the light wind veers,
and the white fog clears,
They see by the after rail
An unknown schooner creeping
up
With mildewed spar and sail.
Her crew lean forth by the
rotting shrouds,
With the Judgment in their
face;
And to their mates’
“God save you!”
Have never a word of grace.
Then into the gray they sheer
away,
On the awful polar tide;
And the sailors know they
have seen the wraith
Of the missing Nancy’s
Pride.
ARNOLD, MASTER OF THE SCUD
There’s a schooner out
from Kingsport,
Through the morning’s
dazzle-gleam,
Snoring down the Bay of Fundy
With a norther on her beam.
How the tough wind springs
to wrestle,
When the tide is on the flood!
And between them stands young
daring—
Arnold, master of the Scud.
He is only “Martin’s
youngster,”
To the Minas coasting fleet,
“Twelve year old, and
full of Satan
As a nut is full of meat.”
With a wake of froth behind
him,
And the gold green waste before,
Just as though the sea this
morning
Were his boat pond by the
door,
Legs a-straddle, grips the
tiller
This young waif of the old
sea;
When the wind comes harder,
only
Laughs “Hurrah!”
and holds her free.
Little wonder, as you watch
him
With the dash in his blue
eye,
Long ago his father called
him
“Arnold, Master,”
on the sly,
While his mother’s heart
foreboded
Reckless father makes rash
son.
So to-day the schooner carries
Just these two whose will
is one.
Now the wind grows moody,
shifting
Point by point into the east.
Wing and wing the Scud is
flying
With her scuppers full of
yeast.
And the father’s older
wisdom
On the sea-line has descried,
Like a stealthy cloud-bank
making
Up to windward with the tide,
Those tall navies of disaster,
The pale squadrons of the
fog,
That maraud this gray world
border
Without pilot, chart, or log,
Ranging wanton as marooners
From Minudie to Manan.
“Heave to, and we’ll
reef, my master!”
Cries he; when no will of
man
Spills the foresail, but a
clumsy
Wind-flaw with a hand like
stone
Hurls the boom round.
In an instant
Arnold, Master, there alone
Sees a crushed corpse shot
to seaward,
With the gray doom in its
face;
And the climbing foam receives
it
To its everlasting place.
What does Arnold, Master,
think you?
Whimper like a child for dread?
That’s not Arnold.
Foulest weather
Strongest sailors ever bred.
And this slip of taut sea-faring
Grows a man who throttles
fear.
Let the storm and dark in
spite now
Do their worst with valor
here!
Not a reef and not a shiver,
While the wind jeers in her
shrouds,
And the flauts of foam and
sea-fog
Swarm upon her deck in crowds,
Flies the Scud like a mad
racer;
And with iron in his frown,
Holding hard by wrath and
dreadnought,
Arnold, Master, rides her
down.
Let the taffrail shriek through
foam-heads!
Let the licking seas go glut
Elsewhere their old hunger,
baffled!
Arnold’s making for
the Gut.
Cleft sheer down, the sea-wall
mountains
Give that one port on the
coast;
Made, the Basin lies in sunshine!
Missed, the little Scud is
lost!
Come now, fog-horn, let your
warning
Rip the wind to starboard
there!
Suddenly that burly-throated
Welcome ploughs the cumbered
air.
The young master hauls a little,
Crowds her up and sheets her
home,
Heading for the narrow entry
Whence the safety signals
come.
Then the wind lulls, and an
eddy
Tells of ledges, where away;
Veers the Scud, sheet free,
sun breaking,
Through the rifts, and—there’s
the bay!
Like a bird in from the storm-beat,
As the summer sun goes down,
Slows the schooner to her
moorings
By the wharf at Digby town.
All the world next morning
wondered.
Largest letters, there it
stood,
“Storm in Fundy.
A Boy’s Daring.
Arnold, Master of the Scud.”
Smile, you inland hills and
rivers!
Flush, you mountains in the
dawn!
But my roving heart is seaward
With the ships of gray St.
John.
Fair the land lies, full of
August,
Meadow island, shingly bar,
Open barns and breezy twilight,
Peace and the mild evening
star.
Gently now this gentlest country
The old habitude takes on,
But my wintry heart is outbound
With the great ships of St.
John.
Once in your wide arms you
held me,
Till the man-child was a man,
Canada, great nurse and mother
Of the young sea-roving clan.
Always your bright face above
me
Through the dreams of boyhood
shone;
Now far alien countries call
me
With the ships of gray St.
John.
Swing, you tides, up out of
Fundy!
Blow, you white fogs, in from
sea!
I was born to be your fellow;
You were bred to pilot me.
At the touch of your strong
fingers,
Doubt, the derelict, is gone;
Sane and glad I clear the
headland
With the white ships of St.
John.
Loyalists, my fathers, builded
This gray port of the gray
sea,
When the duty to ideals
Could not let well-being be.
When the breadth of scarlet
bunting
Puts the wreath of maple on,
I must cheer too,—slip
my moorings
With the ships of gray St.
John.
Peerless-hearted port of heroes,
Be a word to lift the world,
Till the many see the signal
Of the few once more unfurled.
Past the lighthouse, past
the nunbuoy,
Past the crimson rising sun,
There are dreams go down the
harbor
With the tall ships of St.
John.
In the morning I am with them
As they clear the island bar,—
Fade, till speck by speck
the midday
Has forgotten where they are.
But I sight a vaster sea-line,
Wider lee-way, longer run,
Whose discoverers return not
With the ships of gray St.
John.
THE KING OF YS
Wild across the Breton country,
Fabled centuries ago,
Riding from the black sea
border,
Came the squadrons of the
snow.
Piping dread at every latch-hole,
Moaning death at every sill,
The white Yule came down in
vengeance
Upon Ys, and had its will.
Walled and dreamy stood the
city,
Wide and dazzling shone the
sea,
When the gods set hand to
smother
Ys, the pride of Brittany.
Morning drenched her towers
in purple;
Light of heart were king and
fool;
Fair forebode the merrymaking
Of the seven days of Yule.
Laughed the king, “Once
more, my mistress,
Time and place and joy are
one!”
Bade the balconies with banners
Match the splendor of the
sun;
Eyes of urchins shine with
silver,
And with gold the pavement
ring;
Bade the war-horns sound their
bravest
In The Mistress of the
King.
Mountebanks and ballad-mongers
And all strolling traffickers
Should block up the market
corners
With none other name than
hers.
Laughed the fool, “To-day,
my Folly,
Thou shalt be the king of
Ys!”
O wise fool! How long
must wisdom
Under motley hold her peace?
Then the storm came down.
The valleys
Wailed and ciphered to the
dune
Like huge organ pipes; a midnight
Stalked those gala streets
at noon;
And the sea rose, rocked and
tilted
Like a beaker in the hand,
Till the moon-hung tide broke
tether
And stampeded in for land.
All day long with doom portentous,
Shreds of pennons shrieked
and flew
Over Ys; and black fear shuddered
On the hearthstone all night
through.
Fear, which freezes up the
marrow
Of the heart, from door to
door
Like a plague went through
the city,
And filled up the devil’s
score;
Filled her tally of the craven,
To the sea-wind’s dismal
note;
While a panic superstition
Took the people by the throat.
As with morning still the
sea rose
With vast wreckage on the
tide,
And their pasture rills, grown
rivers,
Thundered in the mountain
side,
“Vengeance, vengeance,
gods to vengeance!”
Rose a storm of muttering;
And the human flood came pouring
To the palace of the king.
“Save, O king, before
we perish
In the whirlpools of the sea,
Ys thy city, us thy people!”
Growled the king then, “What
would ye?”
But his wolf’s eyes
talked defiance,
And his bearded mouth meant
scorn.
“O our king, the gods
are angry;
And no longer to be borne
“Is the shameless face
that greets us
From thy windows, at thy side,
Smiling infamy. And therefore
Thou shall take her up, and
ride
“Down with her into
the sea’s mouth,
And there leave her; else
we die,
And thy name goes down to
story
A new word for cruelty.”
Ah, but she was fair, this
woman!
Warm and flaxen waved her
hair;
Her blue Breton eyes made
summer
In that bleak December air.
There she stood whose burning
beauty
Made the world’s high
roof tree ring,
A white poppy tall and wind-blown
In the garden of the king.
Her throat shook, but not
with terror;
Her eyes swam, but not with
fear;
While her two hands caught
and clung to
The one man they had found
dear.
“Lord and lover,”—thus
she smiled him
Her last word,—“it
shall be so,
Only the sea’s arms
shall hold me,
When from out thine arms I
go.”
Swore he, “By the gods,
my mistress,
Thou shall have queen’s
burial.
Pearls and amber shall thy
tomb be;
Shot with gold and green thy
pall.
“And a million-throated
chorus
Shall take up thy dirge to-night;
Where thy slumber’s
starry watch-fires
Shall a thousand years be
bright.”
Then they brought the coal-black
stallion,
Chafing on the bit. Astride
Sprang the young king; shouted,
“Way there!”
Caught the girl up to his
side;
And a path through that scared
rabble
Rode in pageant to the sea.
And the coal-black mane was
mingled
With gold hair against his
knee.
Sure as the wild gulls make
seaward,
From the west gate to the
beach
Rode these two for whom now
freedom
Landward lay beyond their
reach.
And the great horse, scenting
peril,
Snorted at the flying spume,
Flicked with courage, as how
often,
When the tides were racing
doom,
Ridden, he had plunged to
rescue
From that seething icy hell
Some poor sailor wrecked a-fishing
On the coast. What fears
should quell
That high spirit? Knee
to shoulder,
King and stallion reared and
sprang
Clear above the long white
combers
And that turmoil’s iron
clang.
What a launching! For
a moment,
While the tempest held its
breath
And a thousand eyes looked
wonder,
Swimming in that trough of
death,
Steering seaward through the
welter,
Ere they settled out of sight,
Waved above them one gold
streamer.
Valor, bid the world good-night!...
Not a trace, while the long
summers
Warm the heart of Brittany,
Save one stone of Ys, as remnant,
For a white mark in the sea.
Buried alive in calm Rochelle,
Six in a row by a crystal
well,
All Summer long on Bareau
Fen
Slumber and sleep the Kelpie
men;
By the side of each to cheer
his ghost,
A flagon of foam with a crumpet
of frost.
Hear me, friends, for the
years are fleet;
Soon I leave the noise and
the street
For the silent uncompanioned
way
Where the inn is cold and
the night is gray.
But noon is warm and the world
is still
Where the Kelpie riders have
their will.
For never a wind dare stir
or stray
Over those marshes salt and
gray;
No bit of shade as big as
your hand
To traverse or trammel the
sleeping land,
Save where a dozen poplars
fleck
The long gray grass and the
well’s blue beck.
Yet you mark their leaves
are blanched and sear,
Whispering daft at a nameless
fear.
While round the hole of one
is a rune,
Black in the wash of the bleaching
noon.
“Ride, for the wind
is awake and away.
Sleep, for the harvest grain
is gray.”
No word more. And many
a mile,
A ghostly bivouac rank and
file,
They sleep to-day on the marshes
wide;
Some far night they will wake
and ride.
Once they were riders hot
with speed,
“Kelpie, Kelpie, gallop
at need!”
With hills of the barren sea
to roam,
Housing their horses on the
foam.
But earth is cool and the
hush is long
Beneath the lull of the slumber
song
The crickets falter and strive
to tell
To the dragon-fly of the crystal
well;
And love is a forgotten jest,
Where the Kelpie riders take
their rest,
And blossoming grasses hour
by hour
Burn in the bud and freeze
in the flower.
But never again shall their
roving be
On the shifting hills of the
tumbling sea,
With the salt, and the rain,
and the glad desire
Strong as the wind and pure
as fire.
One doomful night in the April
tide
With riot of brooks on the
mountain side,
The goblin maidens of the
hills
Went forth to the revel-call
of the rills.
Many as leaves of the falling
year,
To the swing of a ballad wild
and clear
They held the plain and the
uplands high;
And the merry-dancers held
the sky.
The Kelpie riders abroad on
the sea
Caught sound of that call
of eerie glee,
Over their prairie waste and
wan;
And the goblin maidens tolled
them on.
The yellow eyes and the raven
hair
And the tawny arms blown fresh
and bare,
Were more than a mortal might
behold
And live with the saints for
a crown of gold.
The Kelpie riders were stricken
sore;
They wavered, and wheeled,
and rode for the shore.
“Kelpie, Kelpie, treble
your stride!
Never again on the sea we
ride.
“Kelpie, Kelpie, out
of the storm;
On, for the fields of earth
are warm!”
Knee to knee they are riding
in:
“Brother, brother,—the
goblin kin!”
The meadows rocked as they
clomb the scaur;
The pines re-echo for evermore
The sound of the host of Kelpie
men;
But the windflowers died on
Bareau Fen.
Over the marshes all night
long
The stars went round to a
riding song:
“Kelpie, Kelpie, carry
us through!”
And the goblin maidens danced
thereto.
Till dawn,—and
the revel died with a shout,
For the ocean riders were
wearied out.
They looked, and the grass
was warm and soft;
The dreamy clouds went over
aloft;
A gloom of pines on the weather
verge
Had the lulling sound of their
own white surge;
A whip-poor-will, far from
their din,
Was saying his litanies therein.
Then voices neither loud nor
deep:
“Tired, so tired; sleep!
ah, sleep!
“The stars are calm,
and the earth is warm,
But the sea for an earldom
is given to storm.
“Come now, inherit the
houses of doom;
Your fields of the sun shall
be harried of gloom.”
They laid them down; but over
long
They rest,—for
the goblin maids are strong.
The sun goes round; and Bareau
Fen
Is a door of earth on the
Kelpie men,—
Buried at dawn, asleep, unslain,
With not a mound on the sunny
plain,
Hard by the walls of calm
Rochelle,
Row on row by the crystal
well.
And never again they are free
to ride
Through all the years on the
tossing tide,
Barred from the breast of
the barren foam,
Where the heart within them
is yearning home,—
For one long drench of the
surf to quell
The cursing doom of the goblin
spell.
Only, when bugling snows alight
To smother the marshes stark
and white,
Or a low red moon peers over
the rim
Of a winter twilight crisp
and dim,
With a sound of drift on the
buried lands,
The goblin maidens loose their
hands;
A wind comes down from the
sheer blue North;
And the Kelpie riders get
them forth.
Twice have I been on Bareau
Fen,
But the son of my son is a
man since then.
Once as a lad I used to bear
St. Louis’ cross through
the chapel square,
Leading the choristers’
surpliced file
Slow up the dusk Cathedral
aisle.
I was the boy of all Rochelle
The pure old father trusted
well.
But one clear night in the
winter’s heart,
I wandered out to that place
apart.
The shafts of smoke went up
to the stars,
Straight as the Northern Streamer
spars,
From the town’s white
roofs, so still it was.
The night in her dream let
no word pass,
Nor ever a breath that one
could feel;
Only the snow shrieked under
my heel.
Yet it seemed when I reached
the poplar hole,
The ghost of a voice was crying,
“Skoal!
“Rouse thee and drink,
for the well is sweet,
And the crystal snow is good
to eat!”
I heeded little, but stooped
on my knee,
And ate of a handful dreamily.
’Twas cool to the mouth
and slaking at first,
But the lure of it was ill
for thirst.
The voice cried, “Soul
of the mortal span,
Art thou not of the Kelpie
clan?”
“What are you doing
there in the ground,
Kelpie rider, and never a
sound
“To roam the night but
the ghost of a cry?”
Ringing and swift there came
reply,
“He is asleep where
thou art afraid,
In the tawny arms of a goblin
maid!”
Then I knew the voice was
the voice of a girl,
And I marvelled much (while
a little swirl
Of snow leaped up far off
on the plain
Of sparkling dust and died
again),
For what do the cloisters
know, think ye,
Of women’s ways?
They be hard to see.
Again the voice cried, “Kin
of my kin,
The child of the Sun shall
win, shall win!”
’Twas an evil weird
that so befell;
Yet I leaned and drank of
the bubbling well.
I looked for my face in the
crystal spring,
But the face that flickered
there was a thing
To make the nape of your neck
grow chill,
And every vein surge back
and thrill
With a passion for something
not their own—
In a life their life has never
known.
For raven hair and eyes like
the sun
Are merry but dour to look
upon.
She smiled through her lashes
under the wave,
And my soul went forth her
bartered slave.
I swore, “By St. Louis,
I’ll come to thee,
Though I ride to my doom in
the gulfs of the sea!
“Thy Kelpie rider shall
wake and rue
His ruined life in the loss
of you.”
Then I fled in the start of
a terror of joy,
O’er leagues where a
legion might deploy;
For the acres of snow were
level and hard,
Every flake like a crystal
shard.
I was the runner of all Rochelle,
Could run with the hounds
on Haric Fell;
And something stark as a gust
of the sea
Had a grip of the whimsy boy
in me.
I ran like the drift on the
ice low curled
When the winds of Yule are
abroad on the world.
Sudden, the beat of a throbbing
sound
Lost in the core of the blue
profound:
“Kelpie, Kelpie, Kelpie,
come!”
Was it my heart?—But
my heart was numb.
“Kelpie, Kelpie!”
Was it the sea?
Far on, at the verge of Bareau
lea,
I saw like an army, shield
and casque,
The breakers roll in the Roads
of Basque.
“Kelpie, Kelpie!”
Was it the wolves?
In the dusk of pines where
night dissolves
To streamers and stars through
the mountain gorge,
I heard the blast of a giant
forge.
Then I knew the wind was awake
from the North,
And the ocean riders were
freed and forth.
Time, there is time (now gallop,
my heart!)
Ere the black riders disperse
and depart.
The dawn is late, but the
dawn comes round,
And Fleetfoot Jean has the
wind of a hound.
The hue and cry of the Kelpie
horde
Was growing and grim on that
white seaboard.
It rolled and gathered and
died and grew
Far off to the rear; a smile
thereto
I turned; a fathom behind
my ear
A rider rode with a shadowy
leer.
I sickened and sped.
He laughed aloud,
“Wind for a mourner,
snow for a shroud!”
On and on, half blown, half
blind,
Shadow and self, and the wind
behind!
I slackened, he slackened;
I fled, he flew;
In a swirl of snow-drift all
night through
I scoured along the gusty
fen,
A quarry for hunting Kelpie
men.
But only one could hold at
my side:
“Brother, brother, I
love thy stride.
“Wilt thou follow thy
whim to win
My merry maid of the goblin
kin?”
I swerved from my trail, for
he haunted my ear
With his moaning jibe and
his shadowy leer.
So by good hap as we sped
it fell,
I fetched a circuit back for
the well.
Like a spilth of spume on
the crest of the bore
When the combing tides make
in for shore,
That runner ran whose love
was a wraith;
But the rider rode with revenge
in his teeth.
Another league, and I touch
the goal,—
The mystic rune on the poplar
bole,—
When the dusky eyes and the
raven hair
And the lithe brown arms shall
greet me there.
I ran like a harrier on the trace
In the leash of that ghoul, and the wind gave
chase.
A furlong now; I caught the gleam
Of the bubbling well with its tiny stream;
An arrowy burst; I cleared the
beck;
And—the Kelpie rider bestrode my neck.
* * * * *
Dawn, the still red winter dawn;
I awoke on the plain; the wind was gone;—
All gracious and good as when God
made
The living creatures, and none was afraid.
I stooped to drink of the wholesome
spring
Under the poplars whispering:
Face to my face in that water
clear—
The Kelpie rider’s jabbering
leer!
Ah, God! not me: I was
never so!
Sainted Louis, who can know
The lords of life from the
slaves of death?
What help avail the speeding
breath
Of the spirit that knows not
self’s abode,—
When the soul is lost that
knows not God?
I turned me home by St. Louis’
Hall,
Where the red sun burns on
the windows tall.
And I thought the world was
strange and wild,
And God with his altar only
a child.
Again one year in the prime
of June,
I came to the well in the
heated noon,
Leaving Rochelle with its
red roof tiles
By the Pottery Gate before
St. Giles,—
There where the flower market
is,
Where every morning up from
Duprisse
The flower girls come by the
long white lane
That skirts the edge of Bareau
plain;—
To the North, the city wall
in the sun,
To the left, the fen where
the eye may run
And have its will of the blazing
blue.
The while I loitered the market
through,
Halting a moment to converse
With old Babette who had been
my nurse,
There passed through the stalls
a woman, bright
With a kirtle of cinnabar
and white
Among the kerseys blue; and
I said,
“Who is it, Babette,
with lifted head,
“And the startled look,
possessed and strange,
Under the paint—secure
from change?”
“Ah, ’Sieur Jean,
do ye not ken
Of the eerie folk of Bareau
Fen?”
I blenched, and she knew too
well I wist
The fearsome fate of the goblin
tryst.
“The street is a cruel
home, ’Sieur Jean,
But a weird uncanny drives
her on.
“’Tis a bitter
tale for Christian folk,
How once she dreamed, and
how she woke.”
“Ay, ay!” I passed
and reached the spring
Where the poplars kept their
whispering,
Hid for an hour in the shade,
In the rank marsh grass of
a tiny glade.
There crossed the moor from
the town afar,
In kirtle of white and cinnabar,
A wanderer on that plain of
tears,
Bowed with a burden not of
the years,
As one that goeth sorrowing
For many an unforgotten thing.
To the crystal well as the
sun drew low
There came that harridan of
woe.
She stooped to drink; I heard
her cry:
“Ah, God, how tired
out am I!
“I called him by the
dearest name
A girl may call; I have my
shame.
“‘Yet death is
crueller than life,’
Once they said, ‘for
all the strife.’
“And so I lived; but
the wild will,
Broken and bitter, drives
to ill.
“And now I know, what
no one saith,
That love is crueller than
death.
“How I did love him!
Is love too high,
My God, for such lost folk
as I?”
Her tears went down to the
grass by the well,
In that passion of grief,
and where they fell
Windflowers trembled pale
and white.
A craven I crept away from
the sight;
And turned me home to St.
Louis’ Hall,
Where the sunflowers burn
by the eastern wall.
The vesper frankincense that
day
Rose to the rafters and melted
away,
And was no more than a cloud
that stirs
Among the spires of Norway
firs.
And I said, “The holy
solitude
Of the hoary crypt and the
wild green wood
“Are one to the God
I have never known,
Whose kingdom has neither
bourn nor throne.”
Now I am old, and the years
delay;
But I know, I know, there
will come a day,—
When April is over the Norland
town.
And the loosened brooks from
the hills go down,
When tears have quenched the
sorrow of time,—
Wherein the earth shall rebuild
her prime,
And the houses of dark be
overthrown;
When the goblin maids shall
love their own,—
Their arms forever unlaced
from their hold
Of the earls of the sea on
that alien wold,—
And the feckless light of
their golden eyes
Shall forget the desire that
made them wise;
When the hands of the foam
shall beckon and flee.
And the Kelpie riders ride
for the sea;
And the whip-poor-will the
whole night long
Repeat his litanies of song,
Till morning whiten the world
again,
And the flowers revive on
Bareau Fen,
Over the acres of calm Rochelle
Fresh by the stream of the
crystal well.
NOONS OF POPPY
Noons of poppy, noons of poppy,
Scarlet leagues along the
sea;
Flaxen hair afloat in sunlight,
Love, come down the world
to me!
There’s a Captain I
must ship with,
(Heart, that day be far from
now!)
Wears his dark command in
silence
With the sea-frost on his
brow.
Noons of poppy, noons of poppy,
Purple shadows by the sea;
How should love take thought
to wonder
What the destined port may
be?
Nay, if love have joy for
shipmate
For a night-watch or a year,
Dawn will light o’er
Lonely Haven,
Heart to happy heart, as here.
Noons of poppy, noons of poppy,
Scarlet acres by the sea
Burning to the blue above
them;
Love, the world is full for
me.
There are legends of Lost
Haven,
Come, I know not whence, to
me,
When the wind is in the clover,
When the sun is on the sea.
There are rumors in the pine-tops,
There are whispers in the
grass;
And the flocking crows at
nightfall
Bring home hints of things
that pass
Out upon the broad dike yonder,
All day long beneath the sun,
Where the tall ships cloud
and settle
Down the sea-curve, one by
one.
And the crickets in fine chorus—
Every slim and tiny reed—
Strive to chord the broken
rhythmus
Of the world, and half succeed.
There are myriad traditions
Treasured by the talking rain;
And with memories the moonlight
Walks the cold and silent
plain.
Where the river tells his
hill-tales
To the lone complaining bar,
Where the midgets thread their
dances
To the yellow twilight star,
Where the blossom bends to
hearken
To the bee with velvet bands,
There are chronicles enciphered
Of the yet uncharted lands.
All the musical marauders
Of the berry and the bloom
Sing the lure of soul’s
illusion
Out of darkness, out of doom.
But the sure and great evangel
Comes when half alone I hear,
At the rosy door of silence,
Love, the lord of speech,
draw near.
Then for once across the threshold,
Darkling spirit, thou art
free,—
As thy hope is every ship
makes
Some lost haven of the sea.
THE SHADOW BOATSWAIN
Don’t you know the sailing
orders?
It is time to put to sea,
And the stranger in the harbor
Sends a boat ashore for me.
With the thunder of her canvas
Coming on the wind again,
I can hear the Shadow Boatswain
Piping to his shadow men.
Is it firelight or morning,
That red flicker on the floor?
Your good-by was braver, sweetheart,
When I sailed away before.
Think of this last lovely
summer!
Love, what ails the wind to-night?
What’s he saying in
the chimney
Turns your berry cheek so
white?
What a morning! How the
sunlight
Sparkles on the outer bay,
Where the brig lies waiting
for me
To trip anchor and away!
That’s the Doomkeel.
You may know her
By her clean run aft; and,
then,
Don’t you hear the Shadow
Boatswain
Piping to his shadow men?
Off the freshening sea to
windward,
Is it a white tern I hear
Shrilling in the gusty weather
Where the far sea-line is
clear?
What a morning for departure!
How your blue eyes melt and
shine!
Will you watch us from the
headland
Till we sink below the line?
I can see the wind already
Steer the scurf marks of the
tide,
As we slip the wake of being
Down the sloping world and
wide.
I can feel the vasty mountains
Heave and settle under me,
And the Doomkeel veer and
shudder,
Crumbling on the hollow sea.
There’s a call, as when
a white gull
Cries and beats across the
blue;
That must be the Shadow Boatswain
Piping to his shadow crew.
There’s a boding sound,
like winter
When the pines begin to quail;
That must be the gray wind
moaning
In the belly of the sail.
I can feel the icy fingers
Creeping in upon my bones;
There must be a berg to windward
Somewhere in these border
zones.
Stir the fire.... I love
the sunlight,—
Always loved my shipmate sun.
How the sunflowers beckon
to me
From the dooryard one by one!
How the royal lady roses
Strew this summer world of
ours!
There’ll be none in
Lonely Haven;
It is too far north for flowers.
There, sweetheart! And
I must leave you.
What should touch my wife
with tears?
There’s no danger with
the Master;
He has sailed the sea for
years.
With the sea-wolves on her
quarter,
And a white bone in her teeth,
He will steer the shadow cruiser,
Dark before and doom beneath,
Down the last expanse, till
morning
Flares above the broken sea,
And the midnight storm is
over,
And the Isles are close alee.
So some twilight, when your
roses
Are all blown and it is June,
You will turn your blue eyes
seaward
Through the white dusk of
the moon,
Wondering, as that far sea-cry
Comes upon the wind again,
And you hear the Shadow Boatswain
Piping to his shadow men.
There is rumor in Dark Harbor,
And the folk are all astir;
For a stranger in the offing
Draws them down to gaze at
her,
In the gray of early morning,
Black against the orange streak,
Making in below the ledges,
With no colors at her peak.
Something makes their hearts
uneasy
As they watch the long black
hull,
For she brings the storm behind
her
While before her there is
lull.
With no pilot and unspoken,
Where the dancing breakers
are,
Presently she veers and races
In across the roaring bar,—
Rounds and luffs and comes
to anchor,
While the wharf begins to
throng.
Silence falls upon the women.
And misgiving stirs the strong.
Then with some obscure foreboding,
As a gray-haired watcher smiles,
They perceive the fearless
captain
Is the Master of the Isles.
They recall the bleak December
Many streaming years ago,
When the stranger had been
sighted
Driving shoreward with the
snow;
When the Master came among
them
With his calm and courtly
pride,
And had sailed away at sundown
With pale Dora for his bride;
How again he came one summer
When the herring schools were
late,
And had cleared before the
morning
With old Alec’s son
for mate.
There was glamour with the
Master;
He had tales of far-off seas;
But his habit and demeanor
Were of other lands than these.
He had never made the Harbor
But there sailed away with
him
Wife or child or friend or
lover,
Leaving eyes to strain and
swim,—
Strain and wait for their
returning;
Yet they never had come back;
For the pale wake of the Master
Is a wandering, fading track.
Just beyond our utmost fathom
Is the anchorage we crave,
But the Master knows the soundings
By the reach of every wave.
Just beyond the last horizon,
Vague upon the weather-gleam,
Loom the Faroff Isles forever,
The tradition of a dream.
There a white and brooding
summer
Haunts upon the gray sea-plain,
Where the gray sea-winds are
quiet
At the sources of the rain.
There where all world-weary
dreamers
Get them forth to their release,
Lie the colonies of the kindred,
In the provinces of peace.
Thither in the stormy sunset
Will the Master sail to-night;
And the village will be silent
When he drops below the light.
Not a soul on all the hillside
But will watch her when she
clears,
Dreaming of the Port o’
Strangers
In the roadstead of the years.
“Port o’ Strangers,
Port o’ Strangers!”
“Where away?”
“On the weather bow.”
“Drive her down the
closing distance!"...
That’s to-morrow, but
not now.
What imperial adventure
Some wide morning it will
be,
Sweeping in to Lonely Haven
From the chartless round of
sea!
How imposing a departure,
While this little harbor smiles,
Steering for the outer sea-rim
With the Master of the Isles!
THE LAST WATCH
Comrades, comrades, have me
buried
Like a warrior of the sea,
With a flag across my breast
And my sword upon my knee.
Steering out from vanished
headlands
For a harbor on no chart,
With the winter in the rigging,
With the ice-wind in my heart,
Down the bournless slopes
of sea-room,
With the long gray wake behind,
I have sailed my cruiser steady
With no pilot but the wind.
Battling with relentless pirates
From the lower seas of Doom,
I have kept the colors flying
Through the roar of drift
and gloom.
Scudding where the shadow
foemen
Hang about us grim and stark,
Broken spars and shredded
canvas,
We are racing for the dark.
Sped and blown abaft the sunset
Like a shriek the storm has
caught;
But the helm is lashed to
windward,
And the sails are sheeted
taut.
Comrades, comrades, have me
buried
Like a warrior of the night.
I can hear the bell-buoy calling
Down below the harbor light
Steer in shoreward, loose
the signal,
The last watch has been cut
short;
Speak me kindly to the islesmen,
When we make the foreign port.
We shall make it ere the morning
Rolls the fog from strait
and bluff;
Where the offing crimsons
eastward
There is anchorage enough.
How I wander in my dreaming!
Are we northing nearer home,
Or outbound for fresh adventure
On the reeling plains of foam?
North I think it is, my comrades,
Where one heart-beat counts
for ten,
Where the loving hand is loyal,
And the women’s sons
are men;
Where the red auroras tremble
When the polar night is still,
Lighting home the worn seafarers
To their haven in the hill.
Comrades, comrades, have me
buried
Like a warrior of the North.
Lower me the long-boat, stay
me
In your arms, and bear me
forth;
Lay me in the sheets and row
me,
With the tiller in my hand,
Row me in below the beacon
Where my sea-dogs used to
land.
Has your captain lost his
cunning
After leading you so far?
Row me your last league, my
sea-kings;
It is safe within the bar.
Shoulder me and house me hillward,
Where the field-lark makes
his bed,
So the gulls can wheel above
me,
All day long when I am dead;
Where the keening wind can
find me
With the April rain for guide,
And come crooning her old
stories
Of the kingdoms of the tide.
Comrades, comrades, have me
buried
Like a warrior of the sun;
I have carried my sealed orders
Till the last command is done.
Kiss me on the cheek for courage,
(There is none to greet me
home,)
Then farewell to your old
lover
Of the thunder of the foam;
For the grass is full of slumber
In the twilight world for
me,
And my tired hands are slackened
From their toiling on the
sea.
A lonely sail in the vast
sea-room,
I have put out for the port
of gloom.
The voyage is far on the trackless
tide,
The watch is long, and the
seas are wide.
The headlands blue in the
sinking day
Kiss me a hand on the outward
way.
The fading gulls, as they
dip and veer,
Lift me a voice that is good
to hear.
The great winds come, and
the heaving sea,
The restless mother, is calling
me.
The cry of her heart is lone
and wild,
Searching the night for her
wandered child.
Beautiful, weariless mother
of mine,
In the drift of doom I am
here, I am thine.
Beyond the fathom of hope
or fear,
From bourn to bourn of the
dusk I steer,
Swept on in the wake of the
stars, in the stream
Of a roving tide, from dream
to dream.