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From the Sea
SERENE, indifferent of Fate, | |
| Thou sittest at the Western Gate; | |
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| Upon thy heights so lately won | |
| Still slant the banners of the sun; | |
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| Thou seest the white seas strike their tents, | 5 |
| O Warder of two Continents! | |
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| And scornful of the peace that flies | |
| Thy angry winds and sullen skies, | |
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| Thou drawest all things, small or great, | |
| To thee, beside the Western Gate. * * * * * | 10 |
| O lion’s whelp! that hidest fast | |
| In jungle growth of spire and mast, | |
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| I know thy cunning and thy greed, | |
| Thy hard high lust and wilful deed, | |
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| And all thy glory loves to tell | 15 |
| Of specious gifts material. | |
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| Drop down, O fleecy Fog! and hide | |
| Her sceptic sneer, and all her pride. | |
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| Wrap her, O Fog, in gown and hood | |
| Of her Franciscan Brotherhood. | 20 |
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| Hide me her faults, her sin and blame; | |
| With thy gray mantle cloak her shame! | |
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| So shall she, cowlèd, sit and pray | |
| Till morning bears her sins away. | |
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| Then rise, O fleecy Fog, and raise | 25 |
| The glory of her coming days; | |
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| Be as the cloud that flecks the seas | |
| Above her smoky argosies. | |
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| When forms familiar shall give place | |
| To stranger speech and newer face; | 30 |
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| When all her throes and anxious fears | |
| Lie hushed in the repose of years; | |
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| When Art shall raise and Culture lift | |
| The sensual joys and meaner thrift, | |
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| And all fulfilled the vision, we | 35 |
| Who watch and wait shall never see,— | |
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| Who, in the morning of her race, | |
| Toiled fair or meanly in our place,— | |
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| But, yielding to the common lot, | |
| Lie unrecorded and forgot. | 40 |
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