With eyes half shut, I lie upon the sand
And hear the waters whisper to the land;
And in the east, through flame and gold, is born
The glowing radiance of the sunlit morn.

Far off the light gilds a soft-swelling sail,
That like a lessening star grows slowly pale;
And lazily along low, crested waves,
A solitary gull its white breast laves.

On sloping hills the daisy blossoms show
Their harmony of blended sun and snow,
And from cool sweeps of meadow, sweetly ring
The choral notes that joyous warblers sing.

Here, where the earth and ocean brightly meet,
I lie at ease, and murmurs strangely sweet
Ring through my soul, weird notes that rise from where
The mermaids sing, and comb their yellow hair.

I have dim dreams of wondrous melodies,
By tawny Tritons blown down sapphire seas
That girt some island lying, fair and lone,
In the glad splendor of the tropic zone.

Then fades the present, and I wander far,
Through lands where cities shine out like a star,
Great cities, crowned and glorious with fame,
Whose only memory is a sounding name.

I see the Assyrian maidens wander on,
Beside the terraced heights of Babylon;
And breast the jubilant waves of human foam
That greet the triumph songs of ancient Rome.

I pass where, with slow steps, the pilgrims gray
Toward Jerusalem hold their silent way,
And, dim and far, see spire and minaret
Rise in their grandeur over Olivet.

I hear the merry laugh as plumes advance
Along the shaded ways of sunny France,
Where winsome ladies sway, with dainty charms,
The swords and shields of mighty men-at-arms.

Where sultry Java swelters in the sea,
I watch bright birds flit on from tree to tree,
While, in the fading pomp of ruins old,
The royal flowers of Ind their leaves unfold.

Across the waters of the ocean vast,
I, in the Mayflower, speed before the blast,
And reach the unknown shores that sternly rise
Beneath the gloom of wild, tempestuous skies.

For me the wheat-fields ripen in the plain,
And hill-side orchards croon the sweet refrain
Of winds, made cool by restless wanderings where
The snow-crests gleam in upper heights of air.

The world, and all that it has known, is mine —
For me the grape grows rich with crimson wine,
And caravans, with sweetly tinkling bells,
Gather at eve by deep, palm-shaded wells.

And slowly from the earth there fades away
The clash of swords, and battle-trumpets' bray,
And angel hosts that wing the world above,
With loud hosannahs swell the songs of love.

And lying here, I dream of that glad time
When joyous bells shall ring in every clime,
And crumbling ramparts slumber in sweet rest,
And frowning cannon hold a sparrow's nest.