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(Excerpt)
HER fingers shame the ivory keys | |
| They dance so light along; | |
| The bloom upon her parted lips | |
| Is sweeter than the song. | |
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| O perfumed suitor, spare thy smiles! | 5 |
| Her thoughts are not of thee; | |
| She better loves the salted wind, | |
| The voices of the sea. | |
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| Her heart is like an outbound ship | |
| That at its anchor swings; | 10 |
| The murmur of the stranded shell | |
| Is in the song she sings. | |
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| She sings, and, smiling, hears her praise, | |
| But dreams the while of one | |
| Who watches from his sea-blown deck | 15 |
| The icebergs in the sun. | |
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| She questions all the winds that blow, | |
| And every fog-wreath dim, | |
| And bids the sea-birds flying north | |
| Bear messages to him. | 20 |
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| She speeds them with the thanks of men | |
| He perilled life to save, | |
| And grateful prayers like holy oil | |
| To smooth for him the wave. | |
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| Brown Viking of the fishing-smack! | 25 |
| Fair toast of all the town!— | |
| The skipper’s jerkin ill beseems | |
| The lady’s silken gown! | |
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| But ne’er shall Amy Wentworth wear | |
| For him the blush of shame | 30 |
| Who dares to set his manly gifts | |
| Against her ancient name. | |
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| The stream is brightest at its spring, | |
| And blood is not like wine; | |
| Nor honored less than he who heirs | 35 |
| Is he who founds a line. | |
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| Full lightly shall the prize be won, | |
| If love be Fortune’s spur; | |
| And never maiden stoops to him | |
| Who lifts himself to her. | 40 |
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| Her home is brave in Jaffrey Street, | |
| With stately stairways worn | |
| By feet of old Colonial knights | |
| And ladies gentle-born. | |
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| Still green about its ample porch | 45 |
| The English ivy twines, | |
| Trained back to show in English oak | |
| The herald’s carven signs. | |
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| And on her, from the wainscot old, | |
| Ancestral faces frown,— | 50 |
| And this has worn the soldier’s sword, | |
| And that the judge’s gown. | |
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| But, strong of will and proud as they, | |
| She walks the gallery floor | |
| As if she trod her sailor’s deck | 55 |
| By stormy Labrador! | |
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| The sweetbrier blooms on Kittery-side, | |
| And green are Elliot’s bowers; | |
| Her garden is the pebbled beach, | |
| The mosses are her flowers. | 60 |
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| She looks across the harbor-bar | |
| To see the white gulls fly; | |
| His greeting from the Northern sea | |
| Is in their clanging cry. | |
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| She hums a song, and dreams that he, | 65 |
| As in its romance old, | |
| Shall homeward ride with silken sails | |
| And masts of beaten gold! | |
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| Oh, rank is good, and gold is fair, | |
| And high and low mate ill; | 70 |
| But love has never known a law | |
| Beyond its own sweet will! | |
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