Classic Poem

An infinite shimmer on the open sea —
A thousand, thousand lights! To cross thee now,
And ever — ever — ever — sail away,
Till with thy vastness, with the mighty vault
Which rounds thine urgent being, I am one —
One with the stellar ministers of night
Who throng the splendid spaces of the air
Above thy breezy bosom, one with her
Whose path of pure, illuminated state,
Through all the three-fold phases of her reign,
Is — eve and night — with blanch'd, transfigured face,
Perform'd in silent ecstasy — with these
To unify existence! ... I am yours,
Stars, Sea, Moon — Mother of all mystic thought!
Wrap me, ye Winds, away to some wild place,
Where, in the centre of a surging world
Of crested billows, full of stormy speech,
My sea-dream bark is spell'd, awaiting me.
There is an ecstasy which passes speech,
There is an inspiration which transcends
Expression, there is joy which deifies;
The limitations of our mortal life
Dissolve therein; through every sense enlarged
The floods of rapture pour into the soul.
All these in generous measure have been mine;
But something waits me far from every coast,
From every harbour far — alone, alone!
The promise, the prevision cannot fail;
But drifting, drifting, drifting, day by day,
And drifting, drifting, drifting — moon by moon —
Amid revolving galaxies above,
The scenic splendours and the vibrant glare
Of lissome lightnings, the great organ tones
Of rending thunder — over open seas
I go to seek the threshold of my doom.
Thereon the crests and surges and sea-winds,
There all the echoing voices of the sea,
Shall break with one precipitous music-crash,
Break and dissolve in melody, lute-speech
Which wins towards subtle silence, then the deep
And utter stillness of the anchor'd state,
White peace of sleeping sails in harbour furl'd!