Classic Poem

I

Ten steps it lies from off the sea,
Whose angry breakers score the sand,
A valley of the sleeping land,
Where chirps the cricket quietly.

The aster's bloom, the copses' green,
Grow darker in the softened sun,
And silent here day's course is run,
A sheltered spot that smiles serene.

It reaches far from shore to shore,
Nor house in sight, nor ship or wave,
A silent valley sweet and grave,
A refuge from the sea's wild roar.

Nor gaze from yonder gravelly height, —
Beneath, the crashing billows beat,
The rolling surge of tempests meet
The breakers in their awful might. —

And inland birds soft warble here,
Where golden-rods and yarrow shine,
And cattle pasture — sparest kine!
A rural place for homestead dear.

Go not then, traveller, nigh the shore!
In this soft valley muse content,
Nor brave the cruel element,
That thunders at the valley's door.

And bless the little human dell,
The sheltered copsewood snug and warm, —
Retreat from yon funereal form,
Nor tempt the booming surges' knell.

II

THE OLD WRECKER

He muses slow along the shore,
A stooping form, his wrinkled face
Bronzed dark with storm, no softer grace
Of hope; old, even to the core.

He heeds not ocean's wild lament,
No breaking seas that sight appall, —
The storms he likes, and as they fall
His gaze grows eager, seaward bent.

He grasps at all, e'en scraps of twine,
None is too small, and if some ship
Her bones beneath the breakers dip,
He loiters on his sandy line.

Lonely as ocean is his mien,
He sorrows not, nor questions fate,
Unsought, is never desolate,
Nor feels his lot, nor shifts the scene.

Weary he drags the sinking beach,
Undaunted by the cruel strife,
Alive, yet not the thing of life,
A shipwrecked ghost that haunts the reach.

He breathes the spoil of wreck and sea,
No longer to himself belongs,
Always within his ear thy songs,
Unresting Ocean! bound yet free.

In hut and garden all the same,
Cheerless and slow, beneath content,
The miser of an element
Without a heart, — that none can claim.

Born for thy friend, O sullen wave,
Clasping the earth where none may stand!
He clutches with a trembling hand
The headstones from the sailor's grave.

III

OPEN OCEAN

Unceasing roll the deep green waves,
And crash their cannon down the sand,
The tyrants of the patient land,
Where mariners hope not for graves.

The purple kelp waves to and fro,
The white gulls, curving, scream along;
They fear not thy funereal song,
Nor the long surf that combs to snow.

The hurrying foam deserts the sand,
Afar the low clouds sadly hang,
But the high sea with sullen clang,
Still rages for the silent land.

No human hope or love hast thou,
Unfeeling Ocean! in thy might,
Away — I fly the awful sight,
The working of that moody brow.

The placid sun of autumn shines, —
The hurrying knell marks no decline,
The rush of waves, the war of brine,
Force all, and grandeur, in thy lines.

Could the lone sand-bird once enjoy
Some mossy dell, some rippling brooks,
The fruitful scent of orchard nooks,
The loved retreat of maid or boy!

No, no; the curling billows green,
The cruel surf, the drifting sand,
No flowers or grassy meadow-land,
No kiss of seasons linked between.

The mighty roar, the burdened soul,
The war of waters more and more,
The waves, with crested foam-wreaths hoar,
Rolling to-day, and on to roll.

IV

WINDMILL ON THE COAST

With wreck of ships, and drifting plank,
Uncouth and cumbrous, wert thou built,
Spoil of the sea's unfathomed guilt,
Whose dark revenges thou hast drank.

And loads thy sail the lonely wind,
That wafts the sailor o'er the deep,
Compels thy rushing arms to sweep,
And earth's dull harvesting to grind.

Here strides the fisher lass and brings
Her heavy sack, while creatures small,
Loaded with bag and pail, recall
The youthful joy that works in things.

The winds grind out the bread of life,
The ceaseless breeze torments the stone,
The mill yet hears the ocean's moan,
Her beams the refuse of that strife.

V

ETERNAL SEA

I hear the distant tolling bell,
The echo of the breathless sea;
Bound in a human sympathy
Those sullen strokes no tidings tell.

The spotted sea-bird skims along,
And fisher-boats dash proudly by;
I hear alone that savage cry,
That endless and unfeeling song.

Within thee beats no answering heart,
Cold and deceitful to my race,
The skies alone adorn with grace
Thy freezing waves, or touch with art.

And man must fade, but thou shalt roll
Deserted, vast, and yet more grand;
While thy cold surges beat the strand,
Thy funeral bells ne'er cease to toll.

VI

MICHEL ANGELO — AN INCIDENT

Hard by the shore the cottage stands,
A desert spot, a fisher's house,
There could a hermit keep carouse
On turnip-sprouts from barren sands.

No church or statue greets the view,
Not Pisa's tower or Rome's high wall;
And connoisseurs may vainly call
For Berghem's goat, or Breughel's blue.

Yet meets the eye along a shed,
Blazing with golden splendors rare,
A name to many souls like prayer,
Robbed from a hero of the dead.

It glittered far, the splendid name,
Thy letters, Michel Angelo, —
In this lone spot none e'er can know
The thrills of joy that o'er me came.

Some bark that slid along the main
Dropped off her headboard, and the sea
Plunging it landwards, in the lee
Of these high cliffs it took the lane.

But ne'er that famous Florentine
Had dreamed of such a fate as this,
Where tolling seas his name may kiss,
And curls the lonely sand-strewn brine.

These fearless waves, this mighty sea,
Old Michel, bravely bear thy name!
Like thee, no rules can render tame,
Fatal and grand and sure like thee.

VII

OLD OCEAN

Of what thou dost, I think, not art,
Thy sparkling air and matchless force,
Untouched in thy own wild resource,
The tide of a superior heart.

No human love beats warm below,
Great monarch of the weltering waste!
The fisher-boats make sail and haste,
Thou art their savior and their foe.

Alone the breeze thy rival proves,
Smoothing o'er thee his graceful hand,
Lord of that empire over land,
He moves thy hatred and thy loves.

Yet thy unwearied plunging swell,
Still breaking, charms the sandy reach,
No dweller on the shifting beach,
No auditor of thy deep knell; —

The sunny wave, a soft caress;
The gleaming ebb, the parting day;
The waves like tender buds in May,
A fit retreat for blessedness.

And breathed a sigh like children's prayers,
Across thy light aerial blue,
That might have softened wretches too,
Until they dallied with these airs.

Was there no flitting to thy mood?
Was all this bliss and love to last?
No lighthouse by thy stormy past,
No graveyard in thy solitude!