Gray pilgrim, you have journeyed far,
I pray you tell to me
Is there a land where Love is not,
By shore of any sea?

For I am weary of the god,
And I would flee from him
Tho' I must take a ship and go
Beyond the ocean's rim.

"I know a port where Love is not,
The ship is in your hand,
Then plunge your sword within your breast
And you will reach the land."

Take bread away from me, if you wish,
take air away, but
do not take from me your laughter.

Do not take away the rose,
the lance flower that you pluck,
the water that suddenly
bursts forth in joy,
the sudden wave
of silver born in you.

My struggle is harsh and I come back
with eyes tired
at times from having seen
the unchanging earth,
but when your laughter enters
it rises to the sky seeking me
and it opens for me all
the doors of life.

My love, in the darkest
hour your laughter

Your hand full of hours, you came to me – and I said:
‘Your hair is not brown.’
You lifted it, lightly,
on to the balance of grief,
it was heavier than I.

They come to you on their ships, and make it their load,
then put it on sale in the markets of lust.
You smile at me from the deep.
I weep at you from the scale that’s still light.
I weep: Your hair is not brown.
They offer salt-waves of the sea,
and you give them spume.
You whisper: ‘They’re filling the world with me now,
and for you I’m still a hollow way in the heart!

Your awful voice I hear and I obey,
Brother to Jove and monarch of the sea.
Come down, my blusterers, swell no more,
Your stormy rage give o'er.

To your prisons below,
Down you must go.
In hollow rocks your revels make,
Nor 'till I call your trembling dens forsake.

The sea is never still.
It pounds on the shore
Restless as a young heart,
Hunting.

The sea speaks
And only the stormy hearts
Know what it says:
It is the face
of a rough mother speaking.

The sea is young.
One storm cleans all the hoar
And loosens the age of it.
I hear it laughing, reckless.

They love the sea,
Men who ride on it
And know they will die
Under the salt of it

Let only the young come,
Says the sea.

Let them kiss my face
And hear me.

'Twas on a sunny morning in the month of May,
I met a pretty damsel on the banks o' the Tay;
I said, My charming fair one, come tell to me I pray,
Why do you walk alone on the banks o' the Tay.

She said, Kind sir, pity me, for I am in great woe
About my young sailor lad, whose name is James Munro;
It's he has been long at sea, seven years from this day,
And I come here sometimes to weep for him that's far, far away.

Lovely creature, cease your weeping and consent to marry me,
And my houses and all my land I will give to thee,

I

I cannot heed the words they say,
The lights grow far away and dim,
Amid the laughing men and maids
My eyes unbidden seek for him.

I hope that when he smiles at me
He does not guess my joy and pain,
For if he did, he is too kind
To ever look my way again.

II

I have a secret in my heart
No ears have ever heard,
And still it sings there day by day
Most like a caged bird.

And when it beats against the bars,
I do not set it free,
For I am happier to know
It only sings for me.

420

You'll know it—as you know 'tis Noon—
By Glory—
As you do the Sun—
By Glory—
As you will in Heaven—
Know God the Father—and the Son.

By intuition, Mightiest Things
Assert themselves—and not by terms—
"I'm Midnight"—need the Midnight say—
"I'm Sunrise"—Need the Majesty?

Omnipotence—had not a Tongue—
His listp—is Lightning—and the Sun—
His Conversation—with the Sea—
"How shall you know"?
Consult your Eye!

And here face down beneath the sun
And here upon earth's noonward height
To feel the always coming on
The always rising of the night:

To feel creep up the curving east
The earthy chill of dusk and slow
Upon those under lands the vast
And ever climbing shadow grow

And strange at Ecbatan the trees
Take leaf by leaf the evening strange
The flooding dark about their knees
The mountains over Persia change

And now at Kermanshah the gate
Dark empty and the withered grass
And through the twilight now the late

644

You left me—Sire—two Legacies—
A Legacy of Love
A Heavenly Father would suffice
Had He the offer of—

You left me Boundaries of Pain—
Capacious as the Sea—
Between Eternity and Time—
Your Consciousness—and Me—