She lies across the western main,
Beyond the sunset's rim;
Her quays are packed with reeling mists—
A city strange and dim:
And silent o'er her harbour bar
The ghostly waters brim.
No sound of life is in her streets,
No creak of rope or spar
Comes ever from the water's edge
Where the great vessels are;
Yet ship by ship steals through the mists
Across her harbour bar.
There many a good galleon
Has made her anchor fast,
And many a tall caravel
Her journeyings ends at last;
But no living eye may look upon
That harbour dim and vast.
For one went down in tropic seas,
And one put fearless forth
To find her death in loneliness
'Mid icebergs of the north;
Thus ship by ship and crew by crew
The ocean tried their worth.
She lies across the western main
Beyond the sunset's rim,
Her quays are packed with reeling mists—
A city strange and dim;
And silent o'er her harbour bar
The ghostly waters brim.
THE RIDE OF THE SHADOWS
Behind the pines, when sunset gleams,
The white gates of the Land of Dreams
Stand open wide,
And all adown the golden road
That leads from that most blest abode
The shadows ride,
Who in the light of common day
May now no more abide.
They leave their meads of asphodel,
The starry spaces where they dwell,
Where quiet lies:
They leave their windless, glassy sea,
The angel songs and melody
Of Paradise,
To walk again the old-time way
Once dear to mortal eyes.
With beating heart I watch them ride
Across the gathering shades that hide
That country bright;
The faces that I loved of yore,
Eyes that shall smile on me no more
With mortal light;
Shadows of all good things and fair
Come from the past to-night.