ON what long tides
Do you drift to my fire,
You waifs of strange waters?
From what far seas,
What murmurous sands,
What desolate beaches—
Flotsam of those glories that were ships!
I gather you,
Bitter with salt,
Sun-bleached, rock-scarred, moon-harried,
Fuel for my fire.
You are Pride’s end.
Through all to-morrows you are yesterday.
You are waste,
You are ruin,
For where is that which once you were?
I gather you.
See! I set free the fire within you—
You awake in thin flame!
Tremulous, mistlike, your soul aspires,
Blue, beautiful,
Up and up to the clouds which are its kindred!
What is left is nothing—
Ashes blown along the shore!
When as a Lad
WHEN, as a lad, at break of day
I watched the fishers sail away,
My thoughts, like flocking birds, would follow
Across the curving sky’s blue hollow,
And on and on—
Into the very heart of dawn!
For long I searched the world—ah, me!
I searched the sky, I searched the sea,
With much of useless grief and rueing
Those wingéd thoughts of mine pursuing—
So dear were they,
So lovely and so far away!
I seek them still and always must
Until my laggard heart is dust
And I am free to follow, follow,
Across the curving sky’s blue hollow,
Those thoughts too fleet
For any save the soul’s swift feet!
Laureate
DEATH met a little child who cried
For a bright star which earth denied,
And Death, so sympathetic, kissed it,
Saying: “With me
All bright things be!”—
And only the child’s mother missed it.