SEA VOICES.

Was it a lullaby the Sea went singing

About my feet, some old-world monotone,
Filled full of secret memories, and bringing
Not hope to sting the heart, but peace alone,
Sleep and the certitude of sleep to be
Wiser henceforth than all philosophy?

Truth! did we seek for truth with eye and brain Through days so many and wasted with desire? Listen, the same long gulfing voice again:

Tired limbs lie slack as sands are, eyes that tire Close gently, close forever, twilight grey Receives you, tenderer than the glaring day.

[He sleeps, and after an interval awakes.]

Ah terror, ah delight! A sudden cry,

Anguish, or hope, or triumph. Awake, arise,—

The winds awake! Is ocean's lullaby

This clarion-call? Her kiss, the spray that flies Salt to the lip and cheek? Her motion light Of nursing breasts, this swift pursuit and flight?

O wild sea-voices! Victory and defeat,

But ever deathless passion and unrest, White wings upon the wind and flying feet,

Disdain and wrath, a reared and hissing crest, The imperious urge, and last, a whole life spent In bliss of one supreme abandonment.

ABOARD THE "SEA-SWALLOW."

The gloom of the sea-fronting cliffs

Lay on the water, violet-dark,
The pennon drooped, the sail fell in,
And slowly moved our bark.

A golden day; the summer dreamed
In heaven and on the whispering sea,
Within our hearts the summer dreamed;
The hours had ceased to be.

Then rose the girls with bonnets loosed,
And shining tresses lightly blown,

Alice and Adela, and sang

A song of Mendelssohn.

O sweet, and sad, and wildly clear,

Through summer air it sinks and swells,

Wild with a measureless desire,

And sad with all farewells.

SEA-SIGHING.

This is the burden of the Sea,

Loss, failure, sorrows manifold;

Yet something though the voice sound free

Remains untold.

Listen! that secret sigh again

Kept very low, a whole heart's waste;

What means this inwardness of pain?
This sob repressed?

Some ancient sin, some supreme wrong,

Some huge attempt God brought to nought,

All over while the world was young,

And ne'er forgot?

Those lips, which open wide and cry,

Weak as pale flowers or trembling birds,

Are proud, and fixed immutably
Against such words.

Confession from that burdened soul

No ghostly counsellor may win; Could such as we receive its whole

Passion and sin ?

In this high presence priest or king, Prophet or singer of the earth,

With yon cast sea-weed were a thing Of equal worth.