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The sea; my mother; with billowy swell;
Is telling her tale to the wave…washed shell。
The sea; my mother; is singing to me;
With the starry gleam in her wave;
A dirge of the dead; of the sad; sad sea;
A requiem song of the brave;
Tenderly; sadly; the surges tell
Their tale of death to the wave…washed shell。
The sea; my mother; confides to me;
As she turns to the soft; round moon;
The secrets that lie where the spirits be;
That hide from the garish noon:
The sea; my mother; who loves me well;
Is telling their woe to the wave…washed shell。
O mother o' mine; with the foam…flecked hair;
O mother; I love and know
The heart that is sad and the soul that is bare
To your daughter of ebb and flow;
And I hold your whispers of Heaven and Hell
In the loving heart of a wave…washed shell。
The Silent Tide
I heard Old Ocean raise her voice and cry;
In that still hour between the night and day;
I saw the answering tides; green robed and gray;
Turn to her with a low contented sigh;
Marching with silent feet they passed me by;
For the white moon had taught them to obey;
And scarce a wavelet broke in fretful spray;
As they went forth to kiss the stooping sky。
So; to my heart; when the last sunray sleeps;
And the wan night; impatient for the moon;
Throws her gray mantle over land and sea;
There comes a call from out Life's nether deeps;
And tides; like some old ocean in a swoon;
Flow out; in soundless majesty; to thee。
The Watch on Deck
Becalmed upon the equatorial seas;
A ship of gold lay on a sea of fire;
Each sail and rope and spar; as in desire;
Mutely besought the kisses of a breeze;
Low laughter told the mariners at ease;
Sweet sea…songs hymned the red sun's fun'ral pyre:
Yet One; with eyes that never seemed to tire;
Watched for the storm; nursed on the thunder's knees。
Thou watcher of the spirit's inner keep;
Scanning Death's lone; illimitable deep;
Spread outward to the far immortal shore!
While the vault sleeps; from the upheaving deck;
Thou see'st the adamantine reefs that wreck;
And Life's low shoals; where lusting billows roar。
Autumn
When; with low moanings on the distant shore;
Like vain regrets; the ocean…tide is rolled:
When; thro' bare boughs; the tale of death is told
By breezes sighing; 〃Summer days are o'er〃;
When all the days we loved the days of yore
Lie in their vaults; dead Kings who ruled of old
Unrobed and sceptreless; uncrowned with gold;
Conquered; and to be crowned; ah! never more。
If o'er the bare fields; cold and whitening
With the first snow…flakes; I should see thy form;
And meet and kiss thee; that were enough of Spring;
Enough of sunshine; could I feel the warm
Glad beating of thy heart 'neath Winter's wing;
Tho' Earth were full of whirlwind and of storm。
Mary Gilmore。
A Little Ghost
The moonlight flutters from the sky
To meet her at the door;
A little ghost; whose steps have passed
Across the creaking floor。
And rustling vines that lightly tap
Against the window…pane;
Throw shadows on the white…washed walls
To blot them out again。
The moonlight leads her as she goes
Across a narrow plain;
By all the old; familiar ways
That know her steps again。
And through the scrub it leads her on
And brings her to the creek;
But by the broken dam she stops
And seems as she would speak。
She moves her lips; but not a sound
Ripples the silent air;
She wrings her little hands; ah; me!
The sadness of despair!
While overhead the black…duck's wing
Cuts like a flash upon
The startled air; that scarcely shrinks
Ere he afar is gone。
And curlews wake; and wailing cry
Cur…lew! cur…lew! cur…lew!
Till all the Bush; with nameless dread
Is pulsing through and through。
The moonlight leads her back again
And leaves her at the door;
A little ghost whose steps have passed
Across the creaking floor。
Good…Night
Good…night! 。 。 。 my darling sleeps so sound
She cannot hear me where she lies;
White lilies watch the closed eyes;
Red roses guard the folded hands。
Good…night! O woman who once lay
Upon my breast; so still; so sweet
That all my pulses; throbbing; beat
And flamed I cannot touch you now。
Good…night; my own! God knows we loved
So well; that all things else seemed slight
We part forever in the night;
We two poor souls who loved so well。
Bernard O'Dowd。
Love's Substitute
This love; that dares not warm before its flame
Our yearning hands; or from its tempting tree
Yield fruit we may consume; or let us claim
In Hymen's scroll of happy heraldry
The twining glyphs of perfect you and me
May kindle social fires whence curls no blame;
Find gardens where no fruits forbidden be;
And mottoes weave; unsullied by a shame。
For; love; unmothered Childhood wanly waits
For such as you to cherish it to Youth:
Raw social soils untilled need Love's own verve
That Peace a…flower may oust their weedy hates:
And where Distress would faint from wolfish sleuth
The perfect lovers' symbol is 〃We serve!〃
Our Duty
Yet what were Love if man remains unfree;
And woman's sunshine sordid merchandise:
If children's Hope is blasted ere they see
Its shoots of youth from out the branchlets rise:
If thought is chained; and gagged is Speech; and Lies
Enthroned as Law befoul posterity;
And haggard Sin's ubiquitous disguise
Insults the face of God where'er men be?
Ay; what were Love; my love; did we not love
Our stricken brothers so; as to resign
For Its own sake; the foison of Its dower:
That; so; we two may help them mount above
These layers of charnel air in which they pine;
To seek with us the Presence and the Power?
Edwin James Brady。
The Wardens of the Seas
Like star points in the ether to guide a homing soul
Towards God's Eternal Haven; above the wash and roll;
Across and o'er the oceans; on all the coasts they stand
Tall seneschals of commerce; High Wardens of the Strand
The white lights slowly turning
Their kind eyes far and wide;
The red and green lights burning
Along the waterside。
When Night with breath of aloes; magnolia; spice; and balm
Creeps down the darkened jungles and mantles reef and palm;
By velvet waters making soft music as they surge
The shore lights of dark Asia will one by one emerge
Oh; Ras Marshig by Aden
Shows dull on hazy nights;
And Bombay Channel's laid in
Its 〃In〃 and 〃Outer〃 lights。
When Night; in rain…wet garments comes sobbing cold and grey
Across the German Ocean and South from Stornoway;
Thro' snarling darkness slowly; some fixed and some a…turn;
The bright shore…lights of Europe like welcome tapers burn;
From fierce Fruholmen streaming
O'er Northern ice and snow;
To Cape St。 Vincent gleaming;
These lamps of danger glow。
The dark Etruscan tending his watchfires by the shore;
On sacred altars burning; the world shall know no more;
His temple's column standing against the ancient stars
Is gone; Now bright catoptrics flash out electric bars;
Slow swung his stately Argos
Unto the Tiber's mouth;
But now the Tuscan cargoes
Screw…driven; stagger South。
The lantern of Genoa guides home no Eastern fleets
As when the boy Columbus played in its narrow streets:
No more the Keltic ‘dolmens' their fitful warnings throw
Across the lone Atlantic; so long; so long ago
No more the beaked prows dashing
Shall dare a shoreward foam;
No more will great oars threshing
Sweep Dorian galleys home。
No more the Vikings roaring their sagas wild and weird
Proclaim that Rome has fallen; no more a consul feared
Shall quench the Roman pharos lest Northern pirates free
Be pointed to their plunder on coasts of Italy
Nor shall unwilling lovers;
From Lethean pleasures torn;
Fare nor'ward with those rovers;
To frozen lands forlorn。
The bale…fires and the watch…fires; the wrecker's foul false lure
No more shall vex the shipmen; and on their course secure
Past Pharos in the starlight the tow'ring hulls of Trade
Race in and out from Suez in iron cavalcade;
So rode one sunset olden
Across the dark'ning sea;
With banners silk and golden;
The Barge of Antony!
They loom along the foreshores; they gleam across the Straits;
They guide the feet of Commerce unto the harbor gates。
In nights of storm and thunder; thro' fog and sleet and rain;
Like stars on angels' foreheads; they give man heart again;
Oh; hear the high waves smashing
On Patagonia's shore!
Oh; hear the black waves thresh