Hatteras
A sulphurous sunset illumines the waters commotion
Where never a wave has outrun the tempestuous doom
Of the turbulent flood of the lair of the storms of the ocean,
And crest answers crest with a signal of mutinous spume—
A sunset of sulphurous hue on the waters abhorrent
That plunge to the north and the south and the east and the west,
And leap to the sinister light from the furious torrent
As if they would fain break the spell of their torment and rest.
In the vitreous gleam of the sky with the darkness impending
The billows that, bowl to the lash of the wind and the tide
Break up with intolerant force and infuriate rending
Of limits rebound and rebound by the spirit defied.
For the waves they are weary of sinking and rising and flying,
And weary of wind and the rage of the stream of the deep;
They are weary of cries of despair and the moans of the dying,
And they long for the peace of a tranquil and passionless sleep;
They are weary of dragging the foam-chains in treacherous places,
Of surge and of swirl and of refluent sweep to the shoals,
And weary of washing the ghastly and drowning white faces
That float and cry out to the parting and terrified souls.
But the demon of wreck is their monstrous and merciless master,
And he comes even now from the hot Caribbean afar,
Where the torrid sun breeds to his spirit a host for disaster
That lurks for the fall of a night with no moon and no star.
He has gathered the winds of the tropic and direful tornadoes
That spread devastation by day and destruction by night;
He has sent for his herald the lightning that girts the Barbadoes,
And his mantle is thunder and whirlwind the track of his flight.
He tramples the bays and the straits with disdain and with frantic
Delight smites the waters that crouch in his pitiless way
As he sweeps from the Mexican Gulf to the roaring Atlantic,
Foresignaling storm to the night and the place of his prey.
From the rack of the sky of the twilight a lessening crescent
Sinks into the gathering gloom of the blackness of night,
And the wandering breakers are lit with a gleam phosphorescent
As landward they grieve in the glimmer of Hatteras light—
A glimmer that tracks a lone ship which is toiling and beating
Away from the tempest impending but hopeless to flee—
From the demon that comes with a luminous flame for a greeting
And wings that uncover the maw of the ravenous sea.
And the waves that are weary of wreck and destruction are maddened.
They rise to the call of the trumpeting hurricane king;
They race to salute him in frenzy as if they were gladdened
At sound of his voice and the swoop of his slumberless wing.
In the vortex of tempest the tragedy wild is completed.
At midnight the sky is unclouded and brilliant with stars;
To the fathomless thousands a hundred more dead sink unsheeted,
And the ship rent and mastless is crashing on Hatteras bars.
Where never a wave has outrun the tempestuous doom
Of the turbulent flood of the lair of the storms of the ocean,
And crest answers crest with a signal of mutinous spume—
A sunset of sulphurous hue on the waters abhorrent
That plunge to the north and the south and the east and the west,
And leap to the sinister light from the furious torrent
As if they would fain break the spell of their torment and rest.
In the vitreous gleam of the sky with the darkness impending
The billows that, bowl to the lash of the wind and the tide
Break up with intolerant force and infuriate rending
Of limits rebound and rebound by the spirit defied.
For the waves they are weary of sinking and rising and flying,
And weary of wind and the rage of the stream of the deep;
They are weary of cries of despair and the moans of the dying,
And they long for the peace of a tranquil and passionless sleep;
They are weary of dragging the foam-chains in treacherous places,
Of surge and of swirl and of refluent sweep to the shoals,
And weary of washing the ghastly and drowning white faces
That float and cry out to the parting and terrified souls.
But the demon of wreck is their monstrous and merciless master,
And he comes even now from the hot Caribbean afar,
Where the torrid sun breeds to his spirit a host for disaster
That lurks for the fall of a night with no moon and no star.
He has gathered the winds of the tropic and direful tornadoes
That spread devastation by day and destruction by night;
He has sent for his herald the lightning that girts the Barbadoes,
And his mantle is thunder and whirlwind the track of his flight.
He tramples the bays and the straits with disdain and with frantic
Delight smites the waters that crouch in his pitiless way
As he sweeps from the Mexican Gulf to the roaring Atlantic,
Foresignaling storm to the night and the place of his prey.
From the rack of the sky of the twilight a lessening crescent
Sinks into the gathering gloom of the blackness of night,
And the wandering breakers are lit with a gleam phosphorescent
As landward they grieve in the glimmer of Hatteras light—
A glimmer that tracks a lone ship which is toiling and beating
Away from the tempest impending but hopeless to flee—
From the demon that comes with a luminous flame for a greeting
And wings that uncover the maw of the ravenous sea.
And the waves that are weary of wreck and destruction are maddened.
They rise to the call of the trumpeting hurricane king;
They race to salute him in frenzy as if they were gladdened
At sound of his voice and the swoop of his slumberless wing.
In the vortex of tempest the tragedy wild is completed.
At midnight the sky is unclouded and brilliant with stars;
To the fathomless thousands a hundred more dead sink unsheeted,
And the ship rent and mastless is crashing on Hatteras bars.
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