HOW IT FALLS BY THE SEA
The air was cool, the wind was fresh, the sky
Before him violet, westward tinged with deep
And angry red. Behind him, loose and black,
Great clouds roll'd up; a church, impending, loom'd;
He pass'd with awe beneath its tower of stone—
Square, tall and grey—the graveyard cross'd in haste
And reach'd the wood; beyond its gentle slope
Far stretch'd a plain; and there thin, early mists
Had gather'd; from the orange in the West
A dull glow fell on quiet pool and pond;
The lamps in scatter'd hamlets there and here
Began to glisten. All his later way
The scarlet sunset and the stormy South
Made splendid, and with images sublime
The boy's mind fill'd; while overhead the pale,
Translucent vault of heaven was thinly sown
With gleaming stars; while, above sea, the pure
Unclouded moon her white and crescent disc
Reveal'd, suffusing light sky-wandering clouds
And ether's pensive lilac.
By the shore
He paused, still'd waters washing at his feet,
But far through distance, mingling with the wind,
Giving forth solemn sounds. And turning then,
One mile or more, against keen breeze he kept
His set face steadfast. By his path the wan
And shrinking silverweed, midst stones, maintain'd
A struggling life. A mile or more, sea-waves
Charm'd him with music, moon on moon look'd down
Mirror'd in trembling bosom of the deep.
A mile or more, he watch'd their communing
Till thin clouds stay'd it, till there shew'd alone
One pallid phantom. Then the sun burst forth,
Glory of storm-fill'd wonder, light on dark
Of formless cloud, crying to melt in light.
He stood; heaven's blaze upon his cheek and brow
Smote him. One moment every field and tree—
Great haystacks, fragrant hedges and the thatch
Of cottages—shone in that gorgeous light
As things transfigured. Suddenly the sun—
Beneath grim ruins of empurpled cloud—
Fell swift; the twilight over hills behind
And low champaign in utter gloom devolved.
Awhile the waning glory of the West—
Its broken pageant and fire-shards thereof—
He watch'd; the sullen purple, tinged with gold,
Grew lurid; leaden vapours far away
Were stain'd with blood; but here and there the sky
Laid bare far depths of melancholy blue.
The boy turn'd northward, down a lane which led
Straight from the sea. Beside some stunted elms
He paused; the darkness chill'd him; far and near
He heard loud chafing of incessant waves,
As suddenly a violet dark involved
Their vast expanse, and he, more lone than they,
Knew well how night discourses to the soul.
He started, as a bird, with whirring wings,
Broke forth from covert. The wind died and rose,
But darkness deepening on the early wheat,
Left every green blade visible: his path
Wound pale before him; waver'd stars above;
And still the phantom of the moon behind
Mourn'd at him as he pass'd into the night.
