| |
| NIGHT seems troubled and scarce asleep; | |
| Her brows are gathered in broken rest; | |
| Sullen old lion of grand St. Mark | |
| Lordeth and lifteth his front from the dark, | |
| And a star in the east starts up from the deep, | 5 |
| White as my lilies that grow in the west; | |
| And the day leaps up with a star on his breast. | |
| Hist! men are passing hurriedly. | |
| I see the yellow wide wings of a bark | |
| Sail silently over my morning-star. | 10 |
| I see men move in the moving dark, | |
| Tall and silent as columns are,— | |
| Great sinewy men that are good to see, | |
| With hair pushed back and with open breasts; | |
| Barefooted fishermen seeking their boats, | 15 |
| Brown as walnuts and hairy as goats,— | |
| Brave old water-dogs, wed to the sea, | |
| First to their labors and last to their rests. | |
| |
| Ships are moving! I hear a horn; | |
| A silver trumpet it sounds to me, | 20 |
| Deep-voiced and musical, far a-sea | |
| Answers back, and again it calls. | |
| ’T is the sentinel-boats that watch the town | |
| All night, as mounting her watery walls, | |
| And watching for pirate or smuggler. Down | 25 |
| Over the sea, and reaching away, | |
| And against the east, a soft light falls,— | |
| Silvery soft as the mist of morn, | |
| And I catch a breath like the breath of day. | |
| |
| The east is blooming! Yea, a rose, | 30 |
| Vast as the heavens, soft as a kiss, | |
| Sweet as the presence of woman is, | |
| Rises and reaches and widens and grows | |
| Right out of the sea, as a blooming tree; | |
| Richer and richer, so higher and higher, | 35 |
| Deeper and deeper it takes its hue; | |
| Brighter and brighter it reaches through | |
| The space of heaven and the place of stars, | |
| Till all is as rich as a rose can be, | |
| And my rose-leaves fall into billows of fire. | 40 |
| Then beams reach upward as arms from a sea; | |
| Then lances and arrows are aimed at me. | |
| Then lances and spangles and spars and bars | |
| Are broken and shivered and strewn on the sea; | |
| And around and about me tower and spire | 45 |
| Start from the billows like tongues of fire. | |
| |
