Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE GREEK GALLEY, by GEORGE CABOT LODGE


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE GREEK GALLEY, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: The sound of the sea, the sway of the song, the swing of the oar!
Last Line: We are home at last!
Subject(s): Homecoming; Sea; Ships & Shipping; Ocean


The sound of the sea, the sway of the song, the swing of the oar!
Out of the darkness, over the naked seas,
Our galley is come
With a shiver and leap,
As the blade bites deep
To the sway of back and the bend of knees,
As she drives for home
Out of the darkness, over the naked seas,
To the sound of sea and the sway of song and the sweep of oar!

The scarlet stars swing low to the ocean's floor
Made silver and pearl by the slow resurgent sun,
And the waters break
To a leprous wake,
As over the sea the ripples shake
Between dawn and dark, as for life's sweet sake
The battle of life is fought and won.
And evermore,
To the sound of sea and the sway of song and the swing of oar,
We sever the sentient silences
With our wind and way, where over the seas
The surf booms steady and strong on the scented shore.

Over the sea's unfurrowed fields
The miracle spreads and the darkness yields.
O heart that breaks in the strain and stress
Of sinews bent to the tempered oak! --
The golden gates of the dawn express
Sudden and soft as a girl's caress,
A glimmer of grass and a flash of wing,
An echo of prayer to the censer's swing,
And the altar's pillar of purple smoke.
And over the spray that the rowers fling,
Wide over the tide where the foam-drifts cling,
As the rhythm of muscle and music swing

To the sound of the sea, the sway of the song, the sweep of the oar,
To the crash and cream of waves on the bountiful shore,
The spring breaks scented over the sea!
With a leap of sunlight under the lee,
As she dips her side
To the masterful tide
And lists till the bilge distills through the cypress floor.

O, the lift of blade! O, the clinging and shifting of naked feet!
The coil of muscle that stiffens and swells to the delicate beat
Of breath in the nostrils, of blood in the brain,
As the earth-smell steals to our sense again
From the pebble-blue beach where the shadows lie wet and sweet!

We have fought in the noon for breath --
To the sound of sea and the sway of song and the sweep of oar;
Our bodies would swing at the oars in death,
Nor the rhythm of muscle and music cease,
Nor the weariness end, nor the sad surcease
Of sorrow absolve us: but evermore
Our bodies would swing to the pitiless oar
Till the goal was reached,
Till the galley was beached,
Till we tasted the spring in the forests and pleached
Gardens and vineyards of Greece on the plentiful shore!

The flurry of foam flecked red as the dawn looks over the trees,
And ever the motion of song and the pulse of ineffable seas
That empty and echoless break on the exquisite balance of air, --
And tenderly winged on the morning, a perfumed and delicate breeze,
Where the scent of the sacrifice floats with the distant refrain of a prayer,
Where the cry of a bird and the whisper of grass and the lowing of kine,
Are borne thro' the thunder of waves and the smell of the brine.

And behold! We are come, we are there, we shall pass thro' the fringes of foam --
To the sound of the sea and the sway of the song and the sweep of the oar --
And the galley be lifted and leap like our hearts for the rest that has come --
A spot of sunlight rolls on the reeking floor!
She shall shiver and strike thro' the sundered spray,
And the clean, fresh sand where the ebb tides play
Be gored and gashed with her eager keel;
And our feet shall feel
The swash of sea and the crawl of sand
As we leap to land
And pause and kneel
To the sound of prayer,
While thro' the air
The dawn expands till the shadows are passed
And the noon is over the sea at last!

With our women and slaves, with our oxen and vines, we shall pass from the roar
And the sound of the sea, the sway of the song, the sweep of the oar --
And stand where the burden of spring on the brows of the hills
Is heavy and wet -- where the blowing of pipes and the running of rills
Persist in our ears. -- In the warmth of the sun and the wash of the wind,
In the ceasing of struggle and peace of the mind,
With the wandering passed,
We are home at last!






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