 | Fand and Other Poems |  |
33
THE DYING SEA-GULL.
What change is this that falls on me,
Filling my heart with darkness,
Binding my wings with weariness,
Closely around me presses it,
As night on every hollow of the sea?
Filling my heart with darkness,
Binding my wings with weariness,
Closely around me presses it,
As night on every hollow of the sea?
Will it go by like night?
I deem not so. Night tameth not the waves;
Their strength she lessens not, nor quells their rage,
As this change takes my strength:—
She puts her terror in hearts of beasts and men:
Have I not feared her too?
She passed, and all my heart was as the morn;
But now there falls on me a deeper shade
I strive in vain to scorn.
I deem not so. Night tameth not the waves;
Their strength she lessens not, nor quells their rage,
As this change takes my strength:—
She puts her terror in hearts of beasts and men:
Have I not feared her too?
She passed, and all my heart was as the morn;
But now there falls on me a deeper shade
I strive in vain to scorn.
Perchance no weaker than before am I,
But stronger are the seas and winds.
But this thought also fails.
I see my kindred fly as I once flew;
O'er me they scream and wheel in the flashing air,
The sunlight dazzling through the creamy hue
Of shell-like wings wide-stretched.
What creatures are more wonderful than we?
Born of the joy of purest elements,
Where the insistent winds break up the deep,
Where light meets light we are begotten,
Children of azure air and taintless wave;
We toil not on the gross and sullen land,
Nor take our sustenance thence;
Being, as the wise old prophet sea-bird sang,
The living spray of the sea.
But stronger are the seas and winds.
But this thought also fails.
34
O'er me they scream and wheel in the flashing air,
The sunlight dazzling through the creamy hue
Of shell-like wings wide-stretched.
What creatures are more wonderful than we?
Born of the joy of purest elements,
Where the insistent winds break up the deep,
Where light meets light we are begotten,
Children of azure air and taintless wave;
We toil not on the gross and sullen land,
Nor take our sustenance thence;
Being, as the wise old prophet sea-bird sang,
The living spray of the sea.
Behold the clear surge rolling to the cliff!
It heaves, and from its crest the shower upsprings,
Hov'ring an instant in the whitened air:
Deepward the drops then sink,
And bubbling faint expire:
A moment longer and a wing's breadth higher
Our flight, the end the same.
It heaves, and from its crest the shower upsprings,
Hov'ring an instant in the whitened air:
Deepward the drops then sink,
And bubbling faint expire:
A moment longer and a wing's breadth higher
Our flight, the end the same.
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