As rose and fell like vacant flames, lone morn An evening dim, Ere light had grown articulate in love, Or silence knew Herself as worship. Then didst thou ever move Beneath the blue, An incommunicable mystery, About thy shore; A visible yearning of the earth and sea, That evermore Flung out white arms to catch at some far good Yet unfulfilled, And failing sobbed and sank in solitude With heart unstilled; A voice that ever crying as of old In deserts dumb, With hollow tongue reverberate foretold A Life to come. ELLICE HOPKINS. [From The High Tide.] LO! along the river's bed A mighty eygre reared his crest, And rearing Lindis backward pressed Shook all her trembling bankes amaine ; Flung uppe her weltering walls again. Then bankes came downe with ruin and rout- So farre, so fast the eygre drave, The heart had hardly time to beat, Sobbed in the grasses at oure feet: And all the world was in the sea. JEAN INGELOW. [From Gladys and Her Island.] HE sea THE Was filled with light; in clear blue caverns curled The breakers, and they ran, and seemed to romp, As playing at some rough and dangerous game, While all the nearer waves rushed in to help, And all the farther heaved their heads to peep, And tossed the fishing boats. JEAN INGELOW. [From Honours, Part i.] HEN saunter down that terrace whence the sea TH All fair with wing-like sails you may discern ; Be glad, and say, "This beauty is for me— A thing to love and learn. "For me the bounding in of tides; for me The laying bare of sands when they retreat; The purple flush of calms, the sparkling glee When waves and sunshine meet. JEAN INGELOW. [From The Four Bridges.] "OR I would sail upon the tropic seas, Where fathom long the blood-red dulses grow, And purple, gold, and green, the living blossoms swarm." From A Story of Doom, Book i.] ROLLING among the furrows of the unquiet, Unconsecrate, unfriendly, dreadful sea. JEAN INGELOW. H [From The Dreams that Came True.] HE long THE Illimitable reaches of "the vasty deep." JEAN INGELOW. [From Love the Vampire.] THE level sands and grey, Stretch leagues and leagues away, Down to the border line of sky and foam, A spark of sunset burns, The grey tide-water turns, Back, like a ghost from her forbidden home! ANDREW LANG. [From The Sirens.] HE sea is lonely, the sea is dreary, THE The sea is restless and uneasy; Thou seekest quiet, thou art weary, Where evermore The low west-wind creeps panting up the shore Look how the grey old Ocean From the depth of his heart rejoices, When he hears our restful voices; And all sweet sounds of earth and air That murmurs over the weary sea, And seems to sing from everywhere- And in our green isle rest for evermore! And Echo half wakes in the wooded hill, Doubtfully pausing and murmuring still, "Evermore!" Thus, on Life's weary sea, Heareth the marinere Voices sweet, from far and near, Ever singing low and clear, Ever singing longingly. Is it not better here to be, Than to be toiling late and soon? |