THE GREAT SEDUCER
Who looks too long from his window
At the gray, wide, cold sea,
Where breakers scour the beaches
With fingers of sharp foam;
Who looks too long thro the gray pane
At the mad, wild, bold sea,
Shall sell his hearth to a stranger
And turn his back on home.
Who looks too long from his window—
Tho his wife waits by the fireside—
At a ship's wings in the offing,
At a gull's wings on air,
Shall latch his gate behind him,
Tho his cattle call from the byre-side,
And kiss his wife—and leave her—
And wander everywhere.
Who looks too long in the twilight,
Or the dawn-light, or the noon-light,
Who sees an anchor lifted
And hungers past content,
Shall pack his chest for the world's end,
For alien sun—or moonlight,
And follow the wind, sateless,
To Disillusionment!
K'U-KIANG
Because the sun like a Chinese lantern
Set in a temple of clouds tonight,
I was back in K'u-Kiang!