Here, walled in with the wide waste water,
  Grew the grace of a girl’s lone life,
The sea’s and the sea-wind’s foster-daughter,
  And peace was hers in the main mid strife. 
For her were the rocks clothed round with thunder,
  And the crests of them carved by the storm-smith’s craft: 
For her was the mid storm rent in sunder
      As with passion that wailed and laughed.

For her the sunrise kindled and scattered
  The red rose-leaflets of countless cloud: 
For her the blasts of the springtide shattered
  The strengths reluctant of waves back-bowed. 
For her would winds in the mid sky levy
  Bright wars that hardly the night bade cease
At noon, when sleep on the sea lies heavy,
      For her would the sun make peace.

Peace rose crowned with the dawn on golden
  Lit leagues of triumph that flamed and smiled: 
Peace lay lulled in the moon-beholden
  Warm darkness making the world’s heart mild
For all the wide waves’ troubles and treasons,
  One word only her soul’s ear heard
Speak from stormless and storm-rent seasons,
      And nought save peace was the word.

All her life waxed large with the light of it,
  All her heart fed full on the sound: 
Spirit and sense were exalted in sight of it,
  Compassed and girdled and clothed with it round. 
Sense was none but a strong still rapture,
  Spirit was none but a joy sublime,
Of strength to curb and of craft to capture
      The craft and the strength of Time.

Time lay bound as in painless prison
  There, closed in with a strait small space. 
Never thereon as a strange light risen
  Change had unveiled for her grief’s far face
Three white walls flung out from the basement
  Girt the width of the world whereon
Gazing at night from her flame-lit casement
      She saw where the dark sea shone.

Hardly the breadth of a few brief paces,
  Hardly the length of a strong man’s stride,
The small court flower lit with children’s faces
  Scarce held scope for a bud to hide. 
Yet here was a man’s brood reared and hidden
  Between the rocks and the towers and the foam,
Where peril and pity and peace were bidden
      As guests to the same sure home.

Here would pity keep watch for peril,
  And surety comfort his heart with peace. 
No flower save one, where the reefs lie sterile,
  Gave of the seed of its heart’s increase. 
Pity and surety and peace most lowly
  Were the root and the stem and the bloom of the flower: 
And the light and the breath of the buds kept holy
      That maid’s else blossomless bower.

With never a leaf but the seaweed’s tangle,
  Never a bird’s but the seamew’s note,
It heard all round it the strong storms wrangle,
  Watched far past it the waste wrecks float. 
But her soul was stilled by the sky’s endurance,
  And her heart made glad with the sea’s content;
And her faith waxed more in the sun’s assurance
      For the winds that came and went.