Classic Poem

All night I lay on Devil's Edge
Along an overhanging ledge
Between the sky and sea,
And as I rested, 'waiting sleep,
The windless sky and soundless deep
In one dim blue infinity
Of starry peace encompassed me.

And I remembered drowsily
How 'mid the hills last night I'd lain
Beside a singing moorland burn,
And waked at dawn to feel the rain
Fall on my face as on the fern
That drooped about my heather-bed;
And how by noon the wind had blown
The last grey shred from out the sky,
And blew my homespun jacket dry,
As I stood on the topmost stone
That crowns the cairn on Hawkshaw Head
And caught a gleam of far-off sea,
And heard the wind sing in the bent
Like those far waters calling me;
When, my heart answering to the call,
I followed down the seaward stream
By silent pool and singing fall,
Till with a quiet, keen content
I watched the sun, a crimson ball,
Shoot through grey seas, a fiery gleam,
Then sink in opal deeps from sight.

And with the coming on of night
The wind had dropped; and as I lay,
Retracing all the happy day
And gazing long and dreamily
Across the dim unsounding sea,
Over the far horizon came
A sudden sail of amber flame,
And soon the new moon rode on high
Through cloudless deeps of crystal sky.

Too holy seemed the night for sleep,
And yet I must have slept it seems;
For suddenly I woke to hear
A strange voice singing shrill and clear
Down in a gully black and deep
That cleft the beetling crag in twain.
It seemed the very voice of dreams
That drive hag-ridden souls in fear
Through echoing unearthly vales
To plunge in black slow-crawling streams,
Seeking to drown that cry in vain ...
Or some sea-creature's voice that wails
Through blind white banks of fog unlifting
To God-forgotten sailors drifting
Rudderless to death ...
And as I heard,
Though no wind stirred,
An icy breath
Was in my hair ...
And clutched my heart with cold despair.
But, as the wild song died away,
There came a faltering break
That shivered to a sobbing fall,
And seemed half-human after all.

And yet what foot could find a track
In that deep gully sheer and black —
And singing wildly in the night!
So, wondering, I lay awake
Until the coming of the light
Brought day's familiar presence back.
Down by the harbour-mouth that day
A fisher told the tale to me.
Three months before while out at sea
Young Philip Burn was lost, though how
None knew and none would ever know.
The boat becalmed at noonday lay —
And not a ripple on the sea,
And Philip standing at the bow
When his six comrades went below
To sleep away an hour or so,
Dog-tired with working day and night,
While he kept watch: and not a sound
They heard until at set of sun
They woke and, coming up, they found
The deck was empty, Philip gone —
Yet not another boat in sight,
And not a ripple on the sea.
How he had vanished none could tell.
They only knew the lad was dead
They'd left but now alive and well —
And he, poor fellow, newly wed. . . .
And when they broke the news to her
She spoke no word to any one,
But sat all day and would not stir —
Just staring, staring at the fire
With eyes that never seemed to tire
Until at last the day was done
And darkness came, when she would rise
And seek the door with queer wild eyes,
And wander singing all the night
Unearthly songs beside the sea;
But always the first blink of light
Would find her back at her own door.

'Twas winter when I came once more
To that old village by the shore,
And as at night I climbed the street
I heard a singing low and sweet
Within a cottage near at hand;
And I was glad awhile to stand
And listen by the glowing pane;
And, as I hearkened, that sweet strain
Brought back the night when I had lain
Awake on Devil's Edge ...
And now I knew the voice again,
So different, free of pain and fear —
Its terror turned to tenderness —
And yet the same voice none the less,
Though singing now so true and clear:
And, drawing nigh the window-ledge,
I watched the mother sing to rest
The baby snuggling to her breast.