Poems You Ought to Know

by Elia Wilkinson Peattie

My soul today
Is far away,
Sailing the Vesuvian Bay;
My winged boat,
A bird afloat,
Swims round the purple peaks remote:—

Round purple peaks
It sails, and seeks
Blue inlets and their crystal creeks,
Where high rocks throw,
Through deeps below,
A duplicated golden glow.

Far, vague, and dim,
The mountains swim;
While on Vesuvius’ misty brim
With outstretched hands
The gray smoke stands
O’erlooking the volcanic lands.

Here Ischia smiles
O’er liquid miles;
And yonder, bluest of the isles,
Calm Capri waits,
Her sapphire gates
Beguiling to her bright estates.

I heed not, if
My rippling skiff
Float swift or slow from cliff to cliff;—
With dreamful eyes
My spirit lies
Under the walls of Paradise.

Under the walls
Where swells and falls
The bay’s deep breast at intervals,
At peace I lie,
Blown softly by,
A cloud upon this liquid sky.

The day so mild,
Is Heaven’s own child,
With earth and ocean reconciled;—
The airs I feel
Around me steal
Are murmuring to the murmuring keel.

Over the rail
My hand I trail
Within the shadow of the sail.
A joy intense,
The cooling sense
Glides down my drowsy indolence.

With dreamful eyes
My spirit lies
Where summer sings and never dies,—
O’erveiled with vines.
She glows and shines
Among her future oil and wines.

Her children hid,
The cliffs amid,
Are gamboling with the gamboling kid;
Or down the walls,
With tipsy calls,
Laugh on the rocks like waterfalls.