Milton
I pace the sounding sea-beach and behold
How the voluminous billows roll and run,
Upheaving and subsiding, while the sun
Shines through their sheeted emerald far unrolled,
And the ninth wave, slow gathering fold by fold
All its loose-flowing garments into one,
Plunges upon the shore, and floods the dun
Pale reach of sands, and changes them to gold.
So in majestic cadence rise and fall
The mighty undulations of thy song,
O sightless bard, England's Mæonides!
And ever and anon, high over all
Uplifted, a ninth wave superb and strong,
Floods all the soul with its melodious seas.
poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
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To the Queen
The Door of Death is made of Gold,
That Mortal Eyes cannot behold;
But, when the Mortal Eyes are clos'd,
And cold and pale the Limbs repos'd,
The Soul awakes; and, wond'ring, sees
In her mild Hand the golden Keys:
The Grave is Heaven's golden Gate,
And rich and poor around it wait;
O Shepherdess of England's Fold,
Behold this Gate of Pearl and Gold!
To dedicate to England's Queen
The Visions that my Soul has seen,
And, by Her kind permission, bring
What I have borne on solemn Wing,
From the vast regions of the Grave,
Before Her Throne my Wings I wave;
Bowing before my Sov'reign's Feet,
“The Grave produc'd these Blossoms sweet
“In mild repose from Earthly strife;
“The Blossoms of Eternal Life!”
poem by William Blake from Songs and Ballads (1794)
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In The Harbour: Elegiac Verse
I.
Peradventure of old, some bard in Ionian Islands,
Walking alone by the sea, hearing the wash of the waves,
Learned the secret from them of the beautiful verse elegiac,
Breathing into his song motion and sound of the sea.
For as the wave of the sea, upheaving in long undulations,
Plunges loud on the sands, pauses, and turns, and retreats,
So the Hexameter, rising and singing, with cadence sonorous,
Falls; and in refluent rhythm back the Pentameter flows.
II.
Not in his youth alone, but in age, may the heart of the poet
Bloom into song, as the gorse blossoms in autumn and spring.
III.
Not in tenderness wanting, yet rough are the rhymes of our poet;
Though it be Jacob's voice, Esau's, alas! are the hands.
IV.
Let us be grateful to writers for what is left in the inkstand;
When to leave off is an art only attained by the few.
V.
How can the Three be One? you ask me; I answer by asking,
Hail and snow and rain, are they not three, and yet one?
VI.
By the mirage uplifted, the land floats vague in the ether,
Ships and the shadows of ships hang in the motionless air;
So by the art of the poet our common life is uplifted,
So, transfigured, the world floats in a luminous haze.
VII.
Like a French poem is Life; being only perfect in structure
When with the masculine rhymes mingled the feminine are.
VIII.
Down from the mountain descends the brooklet, rejoicing in
freedom;
Little it dreams of the mill hid in the valley below;
Glad with the joy of existence, the child goes singing and
laughing,
Little dreaming what toils lie in the future concealed.
IX.
As the ink from our pen, so flow our thoughts and our feelings
When we begin to write, however sluggish before.
X.
Like the Kingdom of Heaven, the Fountain of Youth is within us;
If we seek it elsewhere, old shall we grow in the search.
XI.
If you would hit the mark, you must aim a little above it;
Every arrow that flies feels the attraction of earth.
XII.
Wisely the Hebrews admit no Present tense in their language;
While we are speaking the word, it is is already the Past.
XIII.
In the twilight of age all things seem strange and phantasmal,
As between daylight and dark ghost-like the landscape appears.
XIV.
Great is the art of beginning, but greater the art is of ending;
Many a poem is marred by a superfluous verse.
poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
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Cape Byron
Upon the orient utmost of the land,
Enfranchised of the world, alone, and free,
I stood; before me, and on either hand,
The interminable solace of the sea.
A white-winged hour of heaven, a fugitive
Of which the angels wist not, hither fled,
Whose plumy, rustling whispers bid me live
Its length of moments as if grief were dead.
Oh memorable hour of beauteous things!
The heaving azure melting into light;
The chequered sport of fleet o'ershadowings;
The nearer emerald curling into white;
The shoreward billows merging each in each,
To sunder yet again, fold, and unfold;
The shining curve of far-receptive beach;
The silvery wave-kiss on the gladdened gold;
The grandeur of the lone old promontory;
The distant bourne of hills in purple guise,
Athrob with soft enchantment; high in glory
The peak of Warning bosomed in the skies!
Oh all too fair to be so seldom seen,
This shadowy purple on the mountains sleeping—
This sapphire of unutterable sheen—
This beauty-harvest ever ripe for reaping!
For what high end is all this daily boon,
Unseen of man, in sightless silence spent?
Doth lavish Nature vainly importune
The unconscious witness of the firmament?
Or is it that the influent God, whose breath
Informs with glory sea and shore and hill,
His infinite lone rejoicing nourisheth
Upon the beauteous outcome of His will?
Or is it but a patient waiting-while
Against a day when many an eye shall bless,
From lowly cottage and imperial pile,
This wide tranquillity of loveliness;—
Against a day of many-thronging feet,
Of virtues, valours, all that builds and saves—
Of human loves responsive to the sweet
Melodious importunity of waves?
I only know that this empurpled range,
This golden shore, this great transcendent sea,
Are now a memory that will not change
Till I become as they—a memory.
poem by James Brunton Stephens
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Waves of ocean
Each and every wave of ocean
coming out from foetus of ocean
tries to touch the bank
and again returns to the same destination
from where it came.
Aim of each wave is perhaps
only to touch the bank
is it a play or game
or the goal of life
To touch the bank
they have to rise and fall
several times
Man may rise and fall
and finally may loose
God may not happen it so
but waves are determined
to reach the destination
they are not to loose patience
The storm of ocean even fails
to stop the waves of ocean
but the waves are infinitive
like the waves of soul.
poem by Ramesh Rai
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From Horace: Book II:Ode II
Renown'd for lyric and satiric lay,
A two-fold poet, I
Shall on strong wing be upward borne
Above the liquid sky;
No more shall earth my spirit bind-
To heav'n I'll soar, and envy leave behind.
No! my Maecenas, who wast ever just,
A witness to my worth,
By whom I'm counted as a friend,
Despite my humble birth;
I shall not lie forgotten in the grave,
Or pine encircled by the Stygian wave.
Rough grows my skin: anon, my upper half
Is changed into a swan;
Soft down and plumage sprout apace,
My arms and fingers on;
Than Daedalus more swift I soar,
And flap my wings o'er groaning Bosphorus' shore.
By Scythian stream and Colchian shore,
Where Rhine majestic flows,
Where dwell the Dacians wont to hide
Their fear of Roman foes,
O'er Afric's sand, and Hyperborean plain,
Shall sweep in cadence soft my touching strain.
For me I ask no funeral chant
When soaring out of sight;
Unfit the mourner's sighs and tears
To grace my glorious flight:
Let solemn silence rule the general mien,
And no vain pageant crown the closing scene.
poem by Peter John Allan
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The Wasp And The Hornet
THE two proud sisters of the sea,
In glory and in doom!--
Well may the eternal waters be
Their broad, unsculptured tomb!
The wind that rings along the wave,
The clear, unshadowed sun,
Are torch and trumpet o'er the brave,
Whose last green wreath is won!
No stranger-hand their banners furled,
No victor's shout they heard;
Unseen, above them ocean curled,
Safe by his own pale bird;
The gnashing billows heaved and fell;
Wild shrieked the midnight gale;
Far, far beneath the morning swell
Were pennon, spar, and sail.
The land of Freedom! Sea and shore
Are guarded now, as when
Her ebbing waves to victory bore
Fair barks and gallant men;
Oh, many a ship of prouder name
May wave her starry fold,
Nor trail, with deeper light of fame,
The paths they swept of old!
poem by Oliver Wendell Holmes
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The Incomprehensible
FAR in the Heavens my God retires:
My God, the mark of my desires,
And hides his lovely face;
When he descends within my view,
He charms my reason to pursue,
But leaves it tir’d and fainting in th’ unequal chase.
Or if I reach unusual height
Till near his presence brought,
There floods of glory check my flight,
Cramp the bold pinions of my wit,
And all untune my thought;
Plunged in a sea of light I roll,
Where wisdom, justice, mercy, shines;
Infinite rays in crossing lines
Beat thick confusion on my sight, and overwhelm my soul.…
Great God! behold my reason lies
Adoring: yet my love would rise
On pinions not her own:
Faith shall direct her humble flight,
Through all the trackless seas of light,
To Thee, th’ Eternal Fair, the infinite Unknown.
poem by Isaac Watts
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And The Rains Descended And The Floods Came
NOW the far waves roll nearer and more near,
The wind's awake, the pitiless wind's awake,
It shrieks the menace that I dare not hear,
Soon at my feet the angry waves will break
In desolating wrath--and here I stand
Helpless my house is built upon the sand.
O you, whose house upon a rock is set,
Laugh, safe and sure, at threatening wave and wind.
You chose the better part and yet--and yet,
There was no other ground that I could find,
And I was weary and I longed to raise
A house to guard my shivering nights and days.
And it was pleasant in the house I made,
While still the floods and winds were held asleep.
I blessed it at the dawn, at night I prayed
As though its dear foundations had been deep
Sunk in the rock. I whispered in surmise,
'What if winds never wake, floods never rise?'
And now the waves are near and very near,
And here I wait and wonder which may be
The wave in which my house will disappear,
My little house that loved and sheltered me,
Where joy still sings, her garland in her hand,
Built on the sand, oh God, built on the sand!
poem by Edith Nesbit
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Where I Belong
The autumn’s presence has come on strong
The old bull frog’s tweedling his drone
And the bird's chirrups seem to belong
All in a melodious song
In this melodious song
The squirrels fidget behind the pine combs
The owl’s hooting joins right along
A woodpecker is pecking a hymn unknown
All in a melodious song
In this melodious song
And on the ground, I am prone
For I can’t find where I belong
I’m never happy, never strong
For this tune sounds horrible with groans
All in a melodious song
In this melodious song
But what if my purpose, my purpose is known?
To just sometimes listen to this cheerful song
And let it inspire me, all of these tones
All in a melodious song
In this melodious song!
poem by Whitney Albright
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Melodious song
The autumn’s presence has come on strong
The old bull frog’s tweedling his drone
And the bird chirrups and seems to belong
All in a melodious song
In this melodious song
The squirrels fidget behind the pine combs
The owl’s hooting joins right along
A woodpecker is pecking a hymn unknown
All in a melodious song
In this melodious song
And on the ground, I am prone
For I can’t find where I belong
I’m never happy, never strong
For this tune sounds horrible with groans
All in a melodious song
In this melodious song
But what if my purpose, my purpose is known?
To just sometimes listen to this cheerful song
And let it inspire me, all of these tones
All in a melodious song
In this melodious song!
poem by Whitney Albright
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Sandy Thoughts
'Ride this wave with me and know,
That every wave leads to a beach
But every beach is different.
The beach I seek is one where
The sand fits perfectly between my toes
Like your fingers between my hand.
Where the water embraces my skin in warmth,
To remind me how it feels to hold you.
A beach where me and you are the only ones,
To let you know, you are my only one.
I am not afraid of where this wave will take us,
I am afraid that you and I will never see the beach I seek.
That when I look back and think, what could have been,
Should have been, will never be.'
poem by Vinh Nguyen
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The Seas of England
The seas of England are our old delight:
Let the loud billow of the shingly shore
Sing freedom on her breezes evermore
To all earth’s ships that sailing heave in sight!
The gaunt sea-nettle be our fortitude,
Sturdily blowing where the clear wave sips;
O, be the glory of our men and ships
Rapturous, woe unheeding hardihood!
There is great courage in a land that hath
Liberty guarded by the unearthly seas;
And ev’n to find peace at the last in these
How many a sailor hath sailed down to death!
Their names are like a splendour in an old song;
Their record shines like bays along the years;
Their jubilation is the cry man hears
Sailing sun-fronted the vast deeps among.
The seas of England are our old delight:
Let the loud billow of the shingly shore
Sing freedom on her breezes evermore
To all earth’s ships that sailing heave in sight!
poem by Walter de la Mare
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Like the Sea
wave upon wave
i arrive
at the shore of my
being
unconsumed
unfinished
wave upon wave
i lick the
shore
always arriving
at a home
that is never mine
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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The Brook And The Wave. (Birds Of Passage. Flight The Third)
The brooklet came from the mountain,
As sang the bard of old,
Running with feet of silver
Over the sands of gold!
Far away in the briny ocean
There rolled a turbulent wave,
Now singing along the sea-beach,
Now howling along the cave.
And the brooklet has found the billow,
Though they flowed so far apart,
And has filled with its freshness and sweetness
That turbulent, bitter heart!
poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
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Floods
In the dark night, from sweet refreshing sleep
I wake to hear outside my window-pane
The uncurbed fury of the wild spring rain,
And weird winds lashing the defiant deep,
And roar of floods that gather strength and leap
Down dizzy, wreck-strewn channels to the main.
I turn upon my pillow and again
Compose myself for slumber.
Let them sweep;
I once survived great floods, and do not fear,
Though ominous planets congregate, and seem
To foretell strange disasters.
From a dream—
Ah! dear God! such a dream!—I woke to hear,
Through the dense shadows lit by no star's gleam,
The rush of mighty waters on my ear.
Helpless, afraid, and all alone, I lay;
The floods had come upon me unaware.
I heard the crash of structures that were fair;
The bridges of fond hopes were swept away
By great salt waves of sorrow. In dismay
I saw by the red lightning's lurid glare
That on the rock-bound island of despair
I had been cast. Till the dim dawn of day
I heard my castles falling, and the roll
Of angry billows bearing to the sea
The broken timbers of my very soul.
Were all the pent-up waters from the whole
Stupendous solar system to break free,
There are no floods that now can frighten me.
poem by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
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A Sea-Shore Grave. To M. J. L.
By Sidney and Clifford Lanier.
O wish that's vainer than the plash
Of these wave-whimsies on the shore:
"Give us a pearl to fill the gash --
God, let our dead friend live once more!"
O wish that's stronger than the stroke
Of yelling wave and snapping levin;
"God, lift us o'er the Last Day's smoke,
All white, to Thee and her in Heaven!"
O wish that's swifter than the race
Of wave and wind in sea and sky;
Let's take the grave-cloth from her face
And fall in the grave, and kiss, and die!
Look! High above a glittering calm
Of sea and sky and kingly sun,
She shines and smiles, and waves a palm --
And now we wish -- Thy will be done!
poem by Sidney Lanier
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Sheep
LIKE the slow thunder of long seas on the height
Where God has set no sea,
Voices of folded sheep in the quiet of night
Came on the wind to me.
Like the low murmur of full tide on a beach
Where tide shall never roll,
They sent their mournful, inarticulate speech
Heavily on my soul.
Past is my sorrow, the night past, and the morn
Bright on her golden sills.
Only the hill-fold voices drowsily scorn
The comfort of the hills.
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
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Alfred’s Song
In the Beginning when, out of darkness,
The Earth, the Heaven,
The stars, the seasons,
The mighty mainland,
And whale-ploughed water,
By God the Maker
Were formed and fashioned,
Then God made England.
He made it shapely,
With land-locked inlets,
And gray-green nesses;
With rivers roaming
From fair-leafed forests
Through windless valleys,
Past plain and pasture,
To sloping shingle:
Thus God made England.
Then like to the long-backed bounding billows,
That foam and follow
In rolling ridges,
Before and after,
To bluff and headland,
Hither there tided
The loose-limbed Briton,
The lording Roman,
And strong on his oars the sea-borne Saxon,
And now the Norsemen
Who hard with Alfred
Wrestle for England.
But onward and forward,
In far days fairer,
I see this England
Made one and mighty:
Mighty and master
Of all within it.
Mighty and master
Of men high-seated,
Of free-necked labour,
Lowland and upland,
And corn and cattle,
And ploughland peaceful,
Of happy homesteads
That warmly nestle
In holt and hollow.
This is the England,
In fair days forward,
I see and sing of.
Then, mighty and master of all within her,
Of Celt and Briton,
Angle and Frisian,
Saxon and Norseman,
Shall England plough, like the whale and walrus,
The roaring ridges
Of foam-necked water,
With long-oared warships
And keels high-beakëd;
And never a foeman,
Eastward or westward,
Shall dare to raven
Her salt-sea inlets,
Her grim gray nesses,
But, swift at the sight of her rearing cradles,
Shall scud and scatter,
Like wild geese fleeing
'Twixt wave and welkin,
Away from the dread of the shrilling weapons
Of foam-fenced England!
poem by Alfred Austin
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Psalm 93
The eternal and sovereign God.
Jehovah reigns; he dwells in light,
Girded with majesty and might:
The world, created by his hands,
Still on its first foundation stands.
But ere this spacious world was made,
Or had its first foundation laid,
Thy throne eternal ages stood,
Thyself the ever-living God.
Like floods, the angry nations rise,
And aim their rage against the skies;
Vain floods, that aim their rage so high!
At thy rebuke the billows die.
For ever shall thy throne endure;
Thy promise stands for ever sure;
And everlasting holiness
Becomes the dwellings of thy grace.
poem by Isaac Watts
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Ye Mariners of England
Ye Mariners of England,
That guard our native seas,
Whose flag has braved a thousand years
The battle and the breeze,
Your glorious standard launch again
To match another foe,
And sweep through the deep,
While the stormy winds do blow!
While the battle rages loud and long,
And the stormy winds do blow!
The spirits of your fathers
Shall start from every wave,
For the deck it was their field of fame,
And Ocean was their grave.
Where Blake and mighty Nelson fell
Your manly hearts shall glow,
As ye sweep through the deep,
While the stormy winds do blow!
While the battle rages loud and long,
And the stormy winds do blow!
Britannia needs no bulwarks,
No towers along the steep:
Her march is o'er the mountain-waves,
Her home is on the deep.
With thunders from her native oak
She quells the floods below
As they roar on the shore,
When the stormy winds do blow!
When the battle rages loud and long,
And the stormy winds do blow!
The meteor flag of England
Shall yet terrific burn,
Till danger's troubled night depart,
And the star of peace return.
Then, then, ye ocean warriors,
Our song and feast shall flow
To the fame of your name,
When the storm has ceased to blow!
When the fiery fight is heard no more,
And the storm has ceased to blow.
poem by Thomas Campbell
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