Heavily lies on the ocean the storm,
And through the darksome wall of clouds
Quivers the forkèd lightning flash,
Suddenly gleaming and suddenly vanishing,
Like a thought from the head of Cronion.
Over the desert, far-heaving water
Afar the thunders are rolling,
The snowy billowy horses are springing,
Which Boreas’ self did engender
Out of the beautiful mares of Erichton,
And the seafowl are mournfully fluttering,
Like shadowy corpses by Styx,
By Charon repulsed from his desolate bark.
Poor, but merry little ship,
Yonder dancing the strangest dance!
Æolus sends it his briskest attendants,
Who wildly strike up for the frolicsome dance;
The one is piping, another is blowing,
The third is beating the hollow double-bass—
And the staggering sailor stands at the rudder,
And on the compass is steadily looking,
That trembling soul of the vessel,
And raises his hands in entreaty to heaven;
“O rescue me, Castor, thou hero gigantic,
And thou, knight of the ring, Polydeuces!”
3. THE SHIPWRECKED ONE.
Hope and love! All crumbled to atoms,
And I myself, like to a corpse
Thrown up by the growling sea,
Lie on the strand,
The dreary, naked strand.
Before me, the watery waste is heaving
Behind me lie but sorrow and misery,
And over me high are passing the clouds,
The formless grey-hued daughters of air,
Who out of the sea, in misty buckets,
Draw up the water,
And wearily drag it and drag it,
Then spill it again in the sea,
A mournful and tedious business,
And useless as e’en my own life.
The billows murmur, the sea-mews are screaming,
Olden remembrances over me drift,
Dreams long forgotten and images perish’d,
Painfully sweet come to light.
In the North a woman is living,
A beauteous woman, royally fair.
Her slender figure, like a tall cypress,
By an alluring white robe is embraced;
Her dark and flowing tresses,
Like to a blissful night, are streaming
Down from her lofty, braid-crownèd head,
And dreamily-sweetly form ringlets
Over her sweet pale face;
And out of her sweet pale face,
Large and o’erpowering, beams an eye
Like a black sun in radiance.
O thou black sun, how often,
Enchantingly often, I drank from thee
Wild flames of inspiration,
And stood and reel’d, all drunk with fire,—
Then hover’d a mild and dovelike smile
Round the high-contracted haughty lips,
And the high-contracted haughty lips
Breath’d forth words as sweet as moonlight,
And tender as the rose’s fragrance—
And then my spirit ascended,
And flew, like an eagle, straight up into heaven!
Peace, ye billows and sea-mews!
All is now over, happiness, hope,
Hope, ay, and love! I lie on the shore,
A lonely and shipwreckèd man,
And press my countenance glowing
Deep in the humid sand.
4. SUNSET.
The beauteous sun
Hath calmly descended down to the sea;
The heaving waters already are dyed
By dusky night;
Nought but the evening’s red
With golden light still spreadeth o’er them,
And the rushing force of the flood
’Gainst the shore presseth the snowy billows
Which merrily, hastily skip,
Like wool-cover’d flocks of lambkins
Whom the singing sheep-boy at even
Homeward doth drive.
“How fair is the sun!”—
So spake, after long silence, my friend,
Who with me wander’d along the strand,
And half in sport and half in sad earnest
Assured he me that the sun was only
A lovely woman,[26] whom the old sea-god
Out of convenience married;
All the day long she joyously wander’d
In the high heavens, deck’d out with purple,
And glitt’ring with diamonds,
And all-beloved and all-admired
By every mortal creature,
And every mortal creature rejoicing
With her sweet glances’ light and warmth;
But in the evening, impell’d all-disconsolate.
Once more returneth she home
To the moist house and desert arms
Of her grey-headed spouse.