Classic and Contemporary Poetry
ON THE WATERS, by GEORGE WILLIAM RUSSELL Poet's Biography First Line: Our boat drifts in the heart of heat Last Line: Oh! Fly from the enchanted sea! Alternate Author Name(s): A. E. Subject(s): Love; Sailing & Sailors; Sea; Ocean | ||||||||
OUR boat drifts in the heart of heat, In starry dances plays the light; Above the wave our glances meet The warmest world of blue and bright. At harmony are sky and sea; Your face shines on me young and gay, And life has given all to me That heart could wish this happy day. Yet I have grown so sudden old Your laughter sounds afar. I seem As one who wakening tries to hold A figure that he loved in dream, And feels it lost beyond recall In worlds unconquerable; so I Am in an instant rapt from all: I might be veiled within the sky. The clouds swim in the heavenly blue And still I see the waters shine, In tender tones a name floats to A vanished self that once was mine. They thrill me not, I know not how The lips but late so sweetly kissed. A love more ancient draws me now To keep some immemorial tryst. Is love unbounded then so high The love that woke it may not win, When grown to fulness it must fly And seek its own immortal kin? Who are my kinsmen in the vast? And shall I in this soundless calm Find recompense for all the past, Be nearer unto what I am? Have you like me behind the veil A self so mystic and so cold, And if we could each other hail Would all the pallor glow to gold? Speak, for although I have the sense Of destinies about me piled And yet unveiled magnificence, I feel but as a little child, Or one the grave no longer owns, Whose spirit breaks above the sods, Is overlooked from awful thrones And crouches at the feet of gods, Nor sees nor hears he with bowed head The judgment of the shining ring, Nor what high doom at length is said And echoed back from king to king. The doom is spoken. It may be That I shall never more forget In all my thoughts of thee and me The maya wherein life is set, This wizardry shall still pursue All things we had found firm or fair, Till life itself seem frail as dew Or bubble glistening on the air. Your eyes hold mine once more. Your face Again allures. Oh, let us fly! There is some magic in this place Would mar the dream of You and I. Come, let us bend unto the oar, Pull swift, beloved, there may be Safe home on that far glimmering shore; Oh! fly from the enchanted sea! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...HALL OF OCEAN LIFE by JOHN HOLLANDER JULY FOURTH BY THE OCEAN by ROBINSON JEFFERS BOATS IN A FOG by ROBINSON JEFFERS CONTINENT'S END by ROBINSON JEFFERS THE FIGUREHEAD by LEONIE ADAMS A SUMMER NIGHT by GEORGE WILLIAM RUSSELL |
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