ALICE OF THE SEA
I
The wild sweet stainless sea
Was as the soul of thee,
O Alice of the sea, and of the bower
Where Love in tender light
With face and body bright
Shone through youth's one divine impassioned hour.
II
Not any dreary town
Thou hadst, O love, for crown,—
But all the untrodden deep impetuous waters
Urgent in gathered wrath
Were strenuous round thy path,
O fairest-eyed of all earth's fair-eyed daughters!
III
The endless hopes of youth
Were thine, and fervent truth
Waved round thy form exultant her white wings,
And glittering fancies past
Before thee on the blast
And many sacred dreams of many things,
IV
Not in the August air
Alone, love, thou wast fair,
But in the days of dreams that followed thee;
By hills of other lands
The magic of thine hands
Was felt, and thy foot fell by many a sea.
V
Never a summer came
But in the robe of flame
And flowers that wrapped each summer's soft shape round
Thou wast,—and the urgent seas
Still washed as toward thy knees
And still thy beauty winter's chains unbound.
VI
Into the strange dim land
Of Poesy thine hand
Imperious and girl-queenly beckoned me:
And there I found again
With throbs of joy and pain
The clear divine unaltered spirit of thee.
VII
Though round about my head,
Now the old dream hath fled,
Loves many and of other shores have bound
Red flowers, and white and pale,
Are such wreaths of avail
If on life's lintel once thy foot doth sound?
VIII
If once the sense of seas
Comes, and of gracious breeze
That o'er the wide luxurious tideway hovers,
How vanishes the town,
And all its gateways frown,
While smile the sandy cliffs and short oak-covers!
IX
Again the ripples dance
Before our eager glance,
O Alice of the giant-memoried sea:
And suns long-hidden shine,
And pliant gold woodbine
I weave into a circlet meet for thee.
X
Thy beauty made the air
Of summer yet more fair
And every rose of summer softer still:
Thy sweetness made the days
Diviner and my lays
Flash forth like light-beams sparkling down a rill:
XI
Thy splendour made the white
Waves but a lesser sight
And all the moonbeams but inferior rays:
Thy glory made my dreams
Resplendent with wild gleams,—
Made marvellous the far-lit water-ways:
XII
Thy softness made each morn
A joy-god newly born:
Thy tender love was as the hand of thee
Moulding all things anew
Beneath emergent blue
That flamed no more storm-shadowed o'er the sea:
XIII
Thy laughter made the land
No more a waste of sand
Whereover hopeless roamed youth's shuddering tread,
But one wide land of flowers
Wherethrough the honied hours
On wings of quivering rainbow-rapture sped.
XIV
No more when thee I saw
I felt the old strong awe
Of poets, singers elder and divine;
I knew that I might meet,
Because thy mouth was sweet,
Fearless their long and laurel-crownéd line.
XV
I knew that through thy strength
My power would come at length
And that my grey-eyed Alice of the sea
Among their loves would stand,
A queen amid the band
Of English queens through the wild harp of me.
XVI
I stood forth,—and I sang;
Sometimes with sorrow-pang
Smitten, and sometimes pierced with dart of glee;
But ever in my sight
Keeping thy grey eyes' light
And the old light that glistened o'er our sea.
XVII
That this one thing be done
Ere solemn set of sun
I've vowed,—and struggle towards it as I may;
That thy name may be high
'Mid names that cannot die,
When comes for me the closing of my day:
XVIII
That, when no sound again
Is heard, no new love-strain,
No further voice or lyre or harp of me,
Still may thy memory cling,
A pure immortal thing,
To the world's heart as deathless as the sea:
XIX
That, when the new harps come
And men seek back for some
Fairest of those who filled to-day with glee,
They may with rapture find
This singing-wreath I've twined
About thy brows, O lady of the sea:
XX
With rapture not for sake
Of this the song I make,
But for the sake of thee the song's white flower;
Oh, may the future know
Thy beauty, when I go,
Silenced at mine inevitable hour!
XXI
New queens of love will shine,
New waves, as white a line,
Sweep upward, thundering o'er the yellow sands
In autumns crisp and fair,—
But will the new years bear
As sweet a woman as thou for new glad lands?
XXII
Will others of thy name
Come, not the very same,
But even as fair, with singers at their feet?
Will even our old woods thrill
To voices and the hill
For these be whitened with fresh meadow-sweet?
XXIII
Yes:—many a rose most red
Though thou and I be dead
Shall cast imperious perfume through the land,
And many women fair
Wind wonderful dark hair
Or golden ringlets, shining band on band.
XXIV
The new glad streams shall sound
And new delight abound
And new loves' silvery laughter fill with glee
The woods where we with slow
Step wandered long ago;
Again young hearts shall dream beside our sea.
XXV
But ever through my song
The same waves sound their strong
Triumphant pæan,—and the streams pervade
The woods with silver speech
And moons illume the beach
And white flowers fill the tangled forest-shade.
XXVI
In song they speak again;
My singing is the fane
Wherein thou art enshrined with all thy flowers;
There is not one which fails,
From all those summer vales,
To adorn thine own perennial singing-bowers:
XXVII
Not one bud pale and dim
But blossoms in my hymn;
Not one moon-silvered wavelet but doth sound
Within the singing walls
Wherethrough my spirit calls
To thee; wherein thine answering soul is found:
XXVIII
Not one rose but is grand
Within the singing-land,
And oh, thou sea-sweet woman, thou art there
Never diviner yet,
Nor tenderer eyelids wet;
Never more queenly,—never yet more fair:
XXIX
Unchanged and as of old
Thine hand in mine I hold
Within the singing-temple I have made,
And through its arches clear
Thy ringing laugh I hear
And robelike round me falls love long-delayed:
XXX
And with our words the tides
Mix, on the same shore-sides,
And voices of the woods,—thy soul and me
Blending in love as fair
As August morning's air
When first we met, O Alice of the Sea!
1881.
