I shall be nearer, understood:
More prized art thou than perfect good.
And since thou lov'st me, I shall grow
Thy other self—thy Life, thy Joy, thy Woe!
THE FISHER OF THE CAPE.
At morn his bark like a bird
Slips lightly oceanward—
Sail feathering smooth o'er the bay
And beak that drinks the wild spray.
In his eyes beams cheerily
A light like the sun's on the sea,
As he watches the waning strand,
Where the foam, like a waving hand
Of one who mutely would tell
Her love, flutters faintly, "Farewell."
But at night, when the winds arise
And pipe to driving skies,
And the moon peers, half afraid,
Through the storm-cloud's ragged shade,
He hears her voice in the blast
That sighs about the mast,
He sees her face in the clouds
As he climbs the whistling shrouds;
And a power nerves his hand,
Shall bring the bark to land.
SAILOR'S SONG.
The sea goes up; the sky comes down.
Oh, can you spy the ancient town,—
The granite hills so hard and gray,
That rib the land behind the bay?
O ye ho, boys! Spread her wings!
Fair winds, boys: send her home!
O ye ho!
Three years? Is it so long that we
Have lived upon the lonely sea?
Oh, often I thought we'd see the town,
When the sea went up, and the sky came down.
O ye ho, boys! Spread her wings!
Fair winds, boys: send her home!
O ye ho!
Even the winter winds would rouse
A memory of my father's house;
For round his windows and his door
They made the same deep, mouthless roar.
O ye ho, boys! Spread her wings!
Fair winds, boys: send her home!
O ye ho!
And when the summer's breezes beat,
Methought I saw the sunny street
Where stood my Kate. Beneath her hand
She gazed far out, far out from land.
O ye ho, boys! Spread her wings!
Fair winds, boys: send her home!
O ye ho!
Farthest away, I oftenest dreamed
That I was with her. Then, it seemed
A single stride the ocean wide
Had bridged, and brought me to her side.
O ye ho, boys! Spread her wings!
Fair winds, boys: send her home.
O ye ho!