The Coast-Guard.
Emily Huntington Miller.
Do you wonder what I am seeing,
In the heart of the fire, aglow
Like cliffs in a golden sunset,
With a summer sea below?
I see, away to the eastward,
The line of a storm-beat coast,
And I hear the tread of the hurrying waves
Like the tramp of the mailèd host.
And up and down in the darkness,
And over the frozen sand,
I hear the men of the coast-guard
Pacing along the strand,
Beaten by storm and tempest,
And drenched by the pelting rain,
From the shores of Carolina
To the wind-swept bays of Maine.
No matter what storms are raging,
No matter how wild the night,
The gleam of their swinging lanterns
Shines out with a friendly light.
And many a shipwrecked sailor
Thanks God, with his gasping breath,
For the sturdy arms of the surfmen
That drew him away from death.
And so, when the wind is wailing,
And the air grows dim with sleet,
I think of the fearless watchers
Pacing along their beat.
I think of a wreck, fast breaking
In the surf of a rocky shore,
And the life-boat leaping onward
To the stroke of the bending oar.
I hear the shouts of the sailors,
The boom of the frozen sail,
And the creak of the icy halyards
Straining against the gale.
“Courage!” the captain trumpets,
“They are sending help from land!”
God bless the men of the coast-guard,
And hold their lives in His hand!