O thou, God's mariner, heart of mine! For Destiny pursues us well, By sea, by land, through heaven or hell: Bids Life all change and chance defy. Would earth's dark ocean suck thee down? Life loveth life and good: then trust A thread of law runs through thy prayer So Life must live, and Soul must sail, And so, 'mid storm or calm, my bark D. A. Wasson. A WET SHEET AND A FLOWING SEA. 135 A WET SHEET AND A FLOWING SEA. A WET sheet and a flowing sea, A wind that follows fast, That fills the white and rustling sail, And bends the gallant mast,- Away the good ship flies, and leaves Oh for a soft and gentle wind ! But give to me the snoring breeze, There's tempest in yon hornèd moon, Our heritage the sea. Allan Cunningham. MID-OCEAN. WIL ILD fields of ocean, piling heap on heap, Abroad in splendthrift haste, still gathering My spirit owns, but will not bend before This dull brute might and purposeless, of thine; The sea-bird resting on thy wave is more Than thou, by all its faculty divine To suffer; pang is none in this thy roar, Emily Pfeiffer. COME HOME. OME home, come home! and where is home Co for me, Whose ship is driving o'er the trackless sea? To the frail bark here plunging on its way, To the wild waters, shall I turn and say, Fields once I walked in, faces once I knew, Familiar things so old my heart believed them true, SELF-DEPENDENCE. These far, far back, behind me lie, before 137 The dark clouds mutter, and the deep seas roar, And speak to them that 'neath and o'er them roam No words of home. Beyond the clouds, beyond the waves that roar, Where fields as green, and hands and hearts as true, And offer exiles driven far o'er the salt sea-foam But toil and pain must wear out many a day, With accents whispered in his wayworn ear, A voice he dares to listen to, say, Come To thy true home. Come home, come home! and where a home hath he Whose ship is driving o'er the driving sea ? Through clouds that mutter, and o'er waves that roar, Say shall we find, or shall we not, a shore That is, as is not ship or ocean foam, Indeed our home? A. H. Clough. SELF-DEPENDENCE. EARY of myself, and sick of asking WEAR What I am, and what I ought to be, At this vessel's prow I stand, which bears me And a look of passionate desire O'er the sea and to the stars I send ; "Ye who from my childhood up have calm'd me, Calm me, ah, compose me to the end! 66 Ah, once more," I cried "ye stars, ye waters, On my heart your mighty charm renew; Still, still let me, as I gaze upon you, Feel my soul becoming vast like you!" From the intense, clear, star-sown vault of heaven, In the rustling night air came the answer— Unaffrighted by the silence round them, These demand not that the things without them "And with joy the stars perform their shining "Bounded by themselves, and unregardful O air-born voice! long since, severely clear, Matthew Arnold. |