Classic Poem

Never will I return with the black-eyed sea birds,
The white-bodied sea gulls spilling the beauty of their throats into the north:
I am banished from their places; they go wheeling wind-blown;
But my feet are pointed toward savage towers; I am driven forth.

I have no heart in the heaviness of men; I am shaken
Like a thin spear-shaft by the speed of the sea gulls, their screaming cuts deep:
It were better, if I must walk exiled, I should not awaken;
It were better to sleep under water if water would let my flesh sleep.

The wet pattern of gull tracks along the sand coral is smothered
Beneath foam; and the birds give their pale swift beaks to the west. . . .
Would to God, now this hour breaks, I had never been mothered!
Let their cries go sharp over me; let their chilled feet tread my breast!