Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, VOYAGERS, by WILLIAM E. SPENCER


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

VOYAGERS, by                    
First Line: It was part of the lore of a sea-coast town
Last Line: Ay, wearied with questing for the vanished isle.
Alternate Author Name(s): Faust, Henri
Subject(s): Sea; Travel; Ocean; Journeys; Trips


It was part of the lore of a sea-coast town
That a strange white ship once appeared in the bay,
And it was ordered by a captain whose frown
But obscured the mad yearning of eyes sea-grey.

The old tars marveled at the vessel's whiteness,
And old wives whispered at the captain's face;
The white sails floated with a cloudy lightness,
The captain moved with a melancholy grace.

Townfolk had gathered in a holiday throng
To greet the sailor-boys as they came ashore,
But they turned moth-pale when the boats swung along,
For the men were strange like sailor-men of lore.

Granite as sea-cliffs, greyer than stormy sea,
They filed in solemn ranks through a place grown still,
And the townfolk marveled at some ecstasy
That haunted their eyes and bound them to its will.

Expectancy was the baton of their paces,
And eagerness was dominant in their eyes;
They moved like spectres through the town's quiet places,
And they hummed like trees when the south wind dies.

Their march was the sigh of a tired Hosanna,
Their lips were clean and their eyes without guile;
The old wives say they sang of Holy Manna,
The old wives say they spoke of a vanished isle.

But the sunset burned them with disappointment,
And an old despair blurred their eyes haunted-grey;
They knelt by the water and it was ointment
Bread and honey for their keeping, old wives say.

Spectrally they passed in the sudden twilight
That lifted up like fog from a troubled sea;
Townfolk were white-faced like moths by candle-light,
But their eyes were dark-jeweled with ecstasy.

An unreal melody arose from the bay
Where the vessel panted like a snowy flame,
As swift as a coursing star it shot away,
(That it vanished without moving, old wives claim.)

Just a part of the lore of a sea-coast town,
But I sometimes start at the sweep of a bay,
And I know I have tutored my brows to frown
To obscure the mad yearning of eyes sea-grey;

Though I laugh at the thought of songs on manna,
And this tale of sailors without guilt or guile,
There are times I must sigh a tired Hosanna,
Ay, wearied with questing for the vanished isle.





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