The Watch on Deck
Becalmed upon the equatorial seas,
A ship of gold lay on a sea of fire;
Each sail and rope and spar, as in desire,
Mutely besought the kisses of a breeze;
Low laughter told the mariners at ease;
Sweet sea-songs hymned the red sun's fun'ral pyre:
Yet One, with eyes that never seemed to tire,
Watched for the storm, nursed on the thunder's knees.
Thou watcher of the spirit's inner keep,
Scanning Death's lone, illimitable deep,
Spread outward to the far immortal shore!
While the vault sleeps, from the upheaving deck,
Thou see'st the adamantine reefs that wreck,
And Life's low shoals, where lusting billows roar.
Autumn
When, with low moanings on the distant shore,
Like vain regrets, the ocean-tide is rolled:
When, thro' bare boughs, the tale of death is told
By breezes sighing, "Summer days are o'er";
When all the days we loved — the days of yore —
Lie in their vaults, dead Kings who ruled of old —
Unrobed and sceptreless, uncrowned with gold,
Conquered, and to be crowned, ah! never more.
If o'er the bare fields, cold and whitening
With the first snow-flakes, I should see thy form,
And meet and kiss thee, that were enough of Spring;
Enough of sunshine, could I feel the warm
Glad beating of thy heart 'neath Winter's wing,
Tho' Earth were full of whirlwind and of storm.
Mary Gilmore.
A Little Ghost
The moonlight flutters from the sky
To meet her at the door,
A little ghost, whose steps have passed
Across the creaking floor.
And rustling vines that lightly tap
Against the window-pane,
Throw shadows on the white-washed walls
To blot them out again.