Our sails are never lost to sight; We hold the coast with slippery grip; Inshore we cheat its flow, Legging on and off the beach, From York to Beavertail. Here and there to get a load, From Ray to Rio Grande. We split the swell where rings the bell Off Monomoy we fight the gale, Before thou wast a being, made Of spirit, as of flesh, Thou didst sleep beneath the beats And blind, unseeing eyes, Replete with life's abundant flood. Thou didst imbibe the fresh And glorious air, that holds the sweets And watch the flit Of idle shadows to and fro, And brood upon my treasure hid Within my willing flesh. And when there stirred A little limb a tiny hand!— What rapturous thrills of ecstasy Shook all my being to its inmost citadel ! Ah! none but she who has borne A child beneath her breast may know What wondrous thrill and subtle spell Comes from this wondrous woven band That binds a mother to her unborn child Within her womb. So would I sit JULIA NEELY FINCH DEEP WATERS DEATH could not come between us two: What fear of death could be, III If thou, its shadow passing through, But turned and looked at me? Nor yet could pain the vision dim With misty blur of tears; The cup now clouded to the brim, For him who drinketh, clears. Deep waters could not quench the light, I could not miss thee in the throng, AN TASSEL Sutphen MORITURA I AM the mown grass, dying at your feet, sweet.' I am the mown grass, dying at your feet. I am the white syringa, falling now, What matter if I lose my life's brief noon? You laugh, "A snow in June!" I am the white syringa, falling now. Silent cities of the dead Grow as old as hearts of men; Flowers sanctified, that bloom In the sunshine on a tomb, Have their little day, and then, All their grace and glory fled, They are dead amid the dead. Ah, God! how miserably lost The loveliest must be; for naught After a little space there lives (Save the poor words the grave-stone gives To heedless eyes and careless thought) Of pure and blest or passion-tost: A few brief hours of bloom and frost, And where are those who loved the lost? |