A Story Of The Sea-shore Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

Rhyme Scheme: A BCDEFGHIJKKLMNOPQRSA TUVWX YZLA2KB2C2KD2NE2F2G2 NZH2I2B2J2 K2PL2SM2N2IO2N2B2YH P2KQ2R2S2KO2KT2U2AV2 W2X2Y2Y2 R2Z2A3B3C3RHRD3KRY2O 2YSY2B3E3F3G3TB2A2H3 KN2I3KJ3K3KL3 NM3V2V2L3V2KAKV2V2V2 N3RB2D2O3 RSI2B3O2V2O2V2P3ZQ3Z BV2V2A3KZR3O2O2PKS3T 3V2G2KV2BY2V2TNHR YV2U3O2 O2 V3V2V2B2O2W3V2V2X3HY 3V2V3Y2Z3A4V3YR3KV2G V2I3V2O2YV2NV3 R3B4V2Y2V2V2B2C4D4V2 R2 E4B4KB4V2HV2F4V2G4H4 B4F4 I4KB4N2V2V2X3ZV2V2B4 X3B4X3Y2KY2F4F4 Y3F4Y2F4J4V2RG4V2AR KV2BIF4K4V2B4KV2F4V2 V2L4KV2RF4 KF4KB4F4O2V2F4KX3V2M 4V2N4KKF4P3O2X3R KV2F4F4V2Y2V2O4V2V2A 3V2P4G3O2Y2V2R3V2V2V 2V2O2DX3Q4G2X3F4F4O2 V2F4R4V2X3F4F4F4X3V2 V2 KC2 F4B4F4B4 X3C2X3C2 RO2RO2 F4X3F4X3 V2 G2V2V2V2V2F4XV2V2V2O 2X3X3V2V2V2O2ZXK4V2V 2O2C2F4C2XF4ZF4O2ZXF 4C2F4K O2B4X3C2V2C2F4V2F4V2 F4C2F4G2S4C2F4V2R3F4 V2F4P3V2V2X3X3F4V2V2 F4H4KT4P3V2U4V2X3KC2 V2F4RF4F4V2 KV2Q3B4KV2ZV2C2V2B4Z F4V2V2F4F4V2V4ZV2C2M 3NF4M3F4C2W4F4F4N2KV 2V2M3F4 G2V2F4C2R4V2F4C2X4V2 B4F4V2F4V2B4X3Y4V2F4 M3 R3V2F4B4KC2V2X3KV2F4 M3F4C2X3F4C2V2C2B4F4 F4V2F4V2V2V2K4B4KF4K F4J4KC2V2V2C2N2V2N2F 4V2 V2RV2V2C2C2V2F4V2X3C 2 B4V2F4RR3RW4F4F4Z4V2 X3X3F4M3M3F4M3 V2V2F4J4X3V2M3V2RF4C 2C2V2C2 X3V2C2F4F4F4X3V2 F4F4C2F4

INTRODUCTION	A
	-
I sought the long clear twilights of the North	B
When from its nest of trees my father's house	C
Sees the Aurora deepen into dawn	D
Far northward in the East o'er the hill top	E
And fronts the splendours of the northern West	F
Where sunset dies into that ghostly gleam	G
That round the horizon creepeth all the night	H
Back to the jubilance of gracious morn	I
I found my home in homeliness unchanged	J
For love that maketh home unchangeable	K
Received me to the rights of sonship still	K
O vaulted summer heaven borne on the hills	L
Once more thou didst embrace me whom a child	M
Thy drooping fulness nourished into joy	N
Once more the valley pictured forth with sighs	O
Rose on my present vision and behold	P
In nothing had the dream bemocked the truth	Q
The waters ran as garrulous as before	R
The wild flowers crowded round my welcome feet	S
The hills arose and dwelt alone in heaven	A
And all had learned new tales against I came	T
Once more I trod the well known fields with him	U
Whose fatherhood had made me search for God's	V
And it was old and new like the wild flowers	W
The waters and the hills but dearer far	X
	-
Once on a day my cousin Frank and I	Y
Drove on a seaward road the dear white mare	Z
Which oft had borne me to the lonely hills	L
Beside me sat a maiden on whose face	A2
I had not looked since we were boy and girl	K
But the old friendship straightway bloomed anew	B2
The heavens were sunny and the earth was green	C2
The harebells large and oh so plentiful	K
While butterflies as blue as they danced on	D2
Borne purposeless on pulses of clear joy	N
In sportive time to their Aeolian clang	E2
That day as we talked on without restraint	F2
Brought near by memories of days that were	G2
And therefore are for ever by the joy	N
Of motion through a warm and shining air	Z
By the glad sense of freedom and like thoughts	H2
And by the bond of friendship with the dead	I2
She told the tale which I would mould anew	B2
To a more lasting form of utterance	J2
	-
For I had wandered back to childish years	K2
And asked her if she knew a ruin old	P
Whose masonry descending to the waves	L2
Faced up the sea cliff at whose rocky feet	S
The billows fell and died along the coast	M2
'Twas one of my child marvels For each year	N2
We turned our backs upon the ripening corn	I
And sought the borders of the desert sea	O2
O joy of waters mingled with the fear	N2
Of a blind force that knew not what to do	B2
But spent its strength of waves in lashing aye	Y
The rocks which laughed them into foam and flight	H
	-
But oh the varied riches of that port	P2
For almost to the beach but that a wall	K
Inclosed them reached the gardens of a lord	Q2
His shady walks his ancient trees of state	R2
His river which with course indefinite	S2
Wandered across the sands without the wall	K
And lost itself in finding out the sea	O2
Within it floated swans white splendours lay	K
Beneath the fairy leap of a wire bridge	T2
Vanished and reappeared amid the shades	U2
And led you where the peacock's plumy heaven	A
Bore azure suns with green and golden rays	V2
Ah here the skies showed higher and the clouds	W2
More summer gracious filled with stranger shapes	X2
And when they rained it was a golden rain	Y2
That sparkled as it fell an odorous rain	Y2
	-
But there was one dream spot my tale must wait	R2
Until I tell the wonder of that spot	Z2
It was a little room built somehow how	A3
I do not know against a steep hill side	B3
Whose top was with a circular temple crowned	C3
Seen from far waves when winds were off the shore	R
So that beclouded ever in the night	H
Of a luxuriant ivy its low door	R
Half filled with rainbow hues of deep stained glass	D3
Appeared to open right into the hill	K
Never to sesame of mine that door	R
Yielded that room but through one undyed pane	Y2
Gazing with reverent curiosity	O2
I saw a little chamber round and high	Y
Which but to see was to escape the heat	S
And bathe in coolness of the eye and brain	Y2
For it was dark and green Upon one side	B3
A window unperceived from without	E3
Blocked up by ivy manifold whose leaves	F3
Like crowded heads of gazers row on row	G3
Climbed to the top and all the light that came	T
Through the thick veil was green oh kindest hue	B2
But in the midst the wonder of the place	A2
Against the back ground of the ivy bossed	H3
On a low column stood white pure and still	K
A woman form in marble cold and clear	N2
I know not what it was it may have been	I3
A Silence or an Echo fainter still	K
But that form yet if form it can be called	J3
So undefined and pale gleams vision like	K3
In the lone treasure chamber of my soul	K
Surrounded with its mystic temple dark	L3
	-
Then came the thought too joyous to keep joy	N
Turning to very sadness for relief	M3
To sit and dream through long hot summer days	V2
Shrouded in coolness and sea murmurings	V2
Forgot by all till twilight shades grew dark	L3
And read and read in the Arabian Nights	V2
Till all the beautiful grew possible	K
And then when I had read them every one	A
To find behind the door against the wall	K
Old volumes full of tales such as in dreams	V2
One finds in bookshops strange in tortuous streets	V2
Beside me over me soul of the place	V2
Filling the gloom with calm delirium	N3
That wondrous woman statue evermore	R
White radiant fading as the darkness grew	B2
Into a ghostly pallour that put on	D2
To staring eyes a vague and shifting form	O3
	-
But the old castle on the shattered shore	R
Not the green refuge from the summer heat	S
Drew forth our talk that day For as I said	I2
I asked her if she knew it She replied	B3
I know it well and added instantly	O2
A woman used to live my mother tells	V2
In one of its low vaults so near the sea	O2
That in high tides and northern winds it was	V2
No more a castle vault but a sea cave	P3
I found there I replied a turret stair	Z
Leading from level of the ground above	Q3
Down to a vault whence through an opening square	Z
Half window and half loophole you look forth	B
Wide o'er the sea but the dim sounding waves	V2
Are many feet beneath and shrunk in size	V2
To a great ripple I could tell you now	A3
A tale I made about a little girl	K
Dark eyed and pale with long seaweed like hair	Z
Who haunts that room and gazing o'er the deep	R3
Calls it her mother with a childish glee	O2
Because she knew no other This said she	O2
Was not a child but woman almost old	P
Whose coal black hair had partly turned to grey	K
With sorrow and with madness and she dwelt	S3
Not in that room high on the cliff but down	T3
Low down within the margin of spring tides	V2
And then she told me all she knew of her	G2
As we drove onward through the sunny day	K
It was a simple tale with few few facts	V2
A life that clomb one mountain and looked forth	B
Then sudden sank to a low dreary plain	Y2
And wandered ever in the sound of waves	V2
Till fear and fascination overcame	T
And led her trembling into life and joy	N
Alas how many such are told by night	H
In fisher cottages along the shore	R
	-
Farewell old summer day I lay you by	Y
To tell my story and the thoughts that rise	V2
Within a heart that never dared believe	U3
A life was at the mercy of a sea	O2
	-
	-
THE STORY	O2
	-
Aye as it listeth blows the listless wind	V3
Filling great sails and bending lordly masts	V2
Or making billows in the green corn fields	V2
And hunting lazy clouds across the blue	B2
Now like a vapour o'er the sunny sea	O2
It blows the vessel from the harbour's mouth	W3
Out 'mid the broken crests of seaward waves	V2
And hovering of long pinioned ocean birds	V2
As if the white wave spots had taken wing	X3
But though all space is full of spots of white	H
The sailor sees the little handkerchief	Y3
That flutters still though wet with heavy tears	V2
Which draw it earthward from the sunny wind	V3
Blow wind draw out the cord that binds the twain	Y2
And breaks not though outlengthened till the maid	Z3
Can only say I know he is not here	A4
Blow wind yet gently gently blow O wind	V3
And let love's vision slowly gently die	Y
And the dim sails pass ghost like o'er the deep	R3
Lingering a little o'er the vanished hull	K
With a white farewell to the straining eyes	V2
For never more in morning's level beam	G
Will the wide wings of her sea shadowing sails	V2
From the green billowed east come dancing in	I3
Nor ever gliding home beneath the stars	V2
With a faint darkness o'er the fainter sea	O2
Will she the ocean swimmer send a cry	Y
Of home come sailors that shall wake the streets	V2
With sudden pantings of dream scaring joy	N
Blow gently wind blow slowly gentle wind	V3
	-
Weep not oh maiden tis not time to weep	R3
Torment not thou thyself before thy time	B4
The hour will come when thou wilt need thy tears	V2
To cool the burning of thy desert brain	Y2
Go to thy work break into song sometimes	V2
To die away forgotten in the lapse	V2
Of dreamy thought ere natural pause ensue	B2
Oft in the day thy time outspeeding heart	C4
Sending thy ready eye to scout the east	D4
Like child that wearies of her mother's pace	V2
And runs before and yet perforce must wait	R2
	-
The time drew nigh Oft turning from her work	E4
With bare arms and uncovered head she clomb	B4
The landward slope of the prophetic hill	K
From whose green head as on the verge of time	B4
Seer like she gazed shading her hope rapt eyes	V2
From the bewilderment of work day light	H
Far out on the eternity of waves	V2
If from the Hades of the nether world	F4
Her prayers might draw the climbing skyey sails	V2
Up o'er the threshold of the horizon line	G4
For when he came she was to be his wife	H4
And celebrate with rites of church and home	B4
The apotheosis of maidenhood	F4
	-
Time passed The shadow of a fear that hung	I4
Far off upon the horizon of her soul	K
Drew near with deepening gloom and clearing form	B4
Till it o'erspread and filled her atmosphere	N2
And lost all shape because it filled all space	V2
Reaching beyond the bounds of consciousness	V2
But ever in swift incarnations darting	X3
Forth from its infinite a stony stare	Z
A blank abyss an awful emptiness	V2
Ah God why are our souls lone helpless seas	V2
Tortured with such immitigable storm	B4
What is this love that now on angel wing	X3
Sweeps us amid the stars in passionate calm	B4
And now with demon arms fast cincturing	X3
Drops us through all gyrations of keen pain	Y2
Down the black vortex till the giddy whirl	K
Gives fainting respite to the ghastly brain	Y2
Not these the maiden's questions Comes he yet	F4
Or am I widowed ere my wedding day	F4
	-
Ah ranged along our shores on peak or cliff	Y3
Or stone ribbed promontory or pier head	F4
Maidens have aye been standing the same pain	Y2
Deadening the heart throb the same gathering mist	F4
Dimming the eye that would be keen as death	J4
The same fixed longing on the changeless face	V2
Over the edge he vanished came no more	R
There as in childhood's dreams upon that line	G4
Without a parapet to shield the sense	V2
Voidness went sheer down to oblivion	A
Over that edge he vanished came no more	R
	-
O happy those for whom the Possible	K
Opens its gates of madness and becomes	V2
The Real around them those to whom henceforth	B
There is but one to morrow the next morn	I
Their wedding day ever one step removed	F4
The husband's foot ever upon the verge	K4
Of the day's threshold whiteness aye and flowers	V2
Ready to meet him ever in a dream	B4
But faith and expectation conquer still	K
And so her morrow comes at last and leads	V2
The death pale maiden ghost dazzled confused	F4
Into the land whose shadows fall on ours	V2
And are our dreams of too deep blessedness	V2
May not some madness be a kind of faith	L4
Shall not the Possible become the Real	K
Lives not the God who hath created dreams	V2
So stand we questioning upon the shore	R
And gazing hopeful towards the Unrevealed	F4
	-
Long looked the maiden till the visible	K
Half vanished from her eyes the earth had ceased	F4
That lay behind her and the sea was all	K
Except the narrow shore which yet gave room	B4
For her sea haunting feet where solid land	F4
Where rocks and hills stopped frighted suddenly	O2
And earth flowed henceforth on in trembling waves	V2
A featureless a half re molten world	F4
Halfway to the Unseen the Invisible	K
Half seen in the condensed and flowing sky	X3
Which lay so grimly smooth before her eyes	V2
And brain and shrinking soul where power of man	M4
Could never heap up moles or pyramids	V2
Or dig a valley in the unstable gulf	N4
Fighting for aye to make invisible	K
To swallow up and keep her smooth blue smile	K
Unwrinkled and unspotted with the land	F4
Not all the changes on the restless wave	P3
Saving it from a still monotony	O2
Whose only utterance was a dreary song	X3
Of stifled wailing on the shrinking shore	R
	-
Such frenzy slow invaded the poor girl	K
Not hers the hovering sense of marriage bells	V2
Tuning the air with fragrance of sweet sound	F4
But the low dirge that ever rose and died	F4
Recurring without pause or any close	V2
Like one verse chaunted aye in sleepless brain	Y2
Down to the shore it drew her from the heights	V2
Like witch's demon spell that fearful moan	O4
She knew that somewhere in the green abyss	V2
His body swung in curves of watery force	V2
Now in a circle slow revolved and now	A3
Swaying like wind swung bell when surface waves	V2
Sank their roots deep enough to reach the waif	P4
Hither and thither idly to and fro	G3
Wandering unheeding through the heedless sea	O2
A kind of fascination seized her brain	Y2
And drew her onward to the ridgy rocks	V2
That ran a little way into the deep	R3
Like questions asked of Fate by longing hearts	V2
Bound which the eternal ocean breaks in sighs	V2
Along their flats and furrows and jagged backs	V2
Out to the lonely point where the green mass	V2
Arose and sank heaved slow and forceful she	O2
Went and recoiled in terror ever drawn	D
Ever repelled with inward shuddering	X3
At the great heartless miserable depth	Q4
She thought the ocean lay in wait for her	G2
Enticing her with horror's glittering eye	X3
And with the hope that in an hour sure fixed	F4
In some far century aeons remote	F4
She conscious still of love despite the sea	O2
Should in the washing of perennial waves	V2
Sweep o'er some stray bone or transformed dust	F4
Of him who loved her on this happy earth	R4
Known by a dreamy thrill in thawing nerves	V2
For so the fragments of wild songs she sung	X3
Betokened as she sat and watched the tide	F4
Till as it slowly grew it touched her feet	F4
When terror overcame she rose and fled	F4
Towards the shore with fear bewildered eye	X3
And stumbling on the rocks with hasty steps	V2
Cried They are coming coming at my heels	V2
	-
Perhaps like this the songs she used to wail	K
In the rough northern tongue of Aberdeen	C2
	-
Ye'll hae me yet ye'll hae me yet	F4
Sae lang an' braid an' never a hame	B4
Its nae the depth I fear a bit	F4
But oh the wideness aye the same	B4
	-
The jaws come up wi' eerie bark	X3
Cryin' I'm creepy cauld an' green	C2
Come doon come doon he's lyin' stark	X3
Come doon an' steek his glowerin' een	C2
	-
Syne wisht they haud their weary roar	R
An' slide awa' an' I grow sleepy	O2
Or lang they're up aboot my door	R
Yowlin' I'm cauld an' weet an' creepy	O2
	-
O dool dool ye are like the tide	F4
Ye mak' a feint awa' to gang	X3
But lang awa' ye winna bide	F4
An' better greet than aye think lang	X3
	-
Footnote Jaws English breakers	V2
	-
Where'er she fled the same voice followed her	G2
Whisperings innumerable of water drops	V2
Growing together to a giant voice	V2
That sometimes in hoarse rushing undertones	V2
Sometimes in thunderous peals of billowy shouts	V2
Called after her to come and make no stay	F4
From the dim mists that brooded seaward far	X
And from the lonely tossings of the waves	V2
Where rose and fell the raving wilderness	V2
Voices pursuing arms and beckoning hands	V2
Reached shorewards from the shuddering mystery	O2
Then sometimes uplift on a rocky peak	X3
A lonely form betwixt the sea and sky	X3
Watchers on shore beheld her fling wild arms	V2
High o'er her head in tossings like the waves	V2
Then fix them with clasped hands of prayer intense	V2
Forward appealing to the bitter sea	O2
Then sudden from her shoulders she would tear	Z
Her garments one by one and cast them far	X
Into the roarings of the heedless surge	K4
A vain oblation to the hungry waves	V2
Such she did mean it and her pitying friends	V2
Clothed her in vain their gifts did bribe the sea	O2
But such a fire was burning in her brain	C2
The cold wind lapped her and the sleet like spray	F4
Flashed all unheeded on her tawny skin	C2
As oft she brought her food and flung it far	X
Reserving scarce a morsel for her need	F4
Flung it with naked arms and streaming hair	Z
Floating like sea weed on the tide of wind	F4
Coal black and lustreless to feed the sea	O2
But after each poor sacrifice despair	Z
Like the returning wave that bore it far	X
Rushed surging back upon her sickening heart	F4
While evermore she moaned low voiced between	C2
Half muttered and half moaned Ye'll hae me yet	F4
Ye'll ne'er be saired till ye hae ta'en mysel'	K
	-
And as the night grew thick upon the sea	O2
Quenching it all except its voice of storm	B4
Blotting it from the region of the eye	X3
Though still it tossed within the haunted brain	C2
Entering by the portals of the ears	V2
She step by step withdrew like dreaming man	C2
Who power of motion all but paralysed	F4
With an eternity of slowness drags	V2
His earth bound lead like irresponsive feet	F4
Back from a living corpse's staring eyes	V2
Till on the narrow beach she turned her round	F4
Then clothed in all the might of the Unseen	C2
Terror grew ghostly and she shrieked and fled	F4
Up to the battered base of the old tower	G2
And round the rock and through the arched gap	S4
Cleaving the blackness of the vault within	C2
Then sank upon the sand and gasped and raved	F4
This was her secret chamber this her place	V2
Of refuge from the outstretched demon deep	R3
All eye and voice for her Argus more dread	F4
Than he with hundred lidless watching orbs	V2
There cowering in a nook she sat all night	F4
Her eyes fixed on the entrance of the cave	P3
Through which a pale light shimmered from the sea	V2
Until she slept and saw the sea in dreams	V2
Except in stormy nights when all was dark	X3
And the wild tempest swept with slanting wing	X3
Against her refuge and the heavy spray	F4
Shot through the doorway serpentine cold arms	V2
To seize the fore doomed morsel of the sea	V2
Then she slept never and she would have died	F4
But that she evermore was stung to life	H4
By new sea terrors Sometimes the sea gull	K
With clanging pinions darted through the arch	T4
And flapped them round her face sometimes a wave	P3
If tides were high and winds from off the sea	V2
Rushed through the door and in its watery mesh	U4
Clasped her waist high then out again to sea	V2
Out to the devilish laughter and the fog	X3
While she clung screaming to the bare rock wall	K
Then sat unmoving till the low grey dawn	C2
Grew on the misty dance of spouting waves	V2
That mixed the grey with white picture one hued	F4
Seen in the framework of the arched door	R
Then the old fascination drew her out	F4
Till wrapt in misty spray moveless she stood	F4
Upon the border of the dawning sea	V2
	-
And yet she had a chamber in her soul	K
The innermost of all a quiet place	V2
But which she could not enter for the love	Q3
That kept her out for ever in the storm	B4
Could she have entered all had been as still	K
As summer evening or a mother's arms	V2
And she had found her lost love sleeping there	Z
Thou too hast such a chamber quiet place	V2
Where God is waiting for thee Is it gain	C2
Or the confused murmur of the sea	V2
Of human voices on the rocks of fame	B4
That will not let thee enter Is it care	Z
For the provision of the unborn day	F4
As if thou wert a God that must foresee	V2
Lest his great sun should chance forget to rise	V2
Or pride that thou art some one in the world	F4
And men must bow before thee Oh go mad	F4
For love of some one lost for some old voice	V2
Which first thou madest sing and after sob	V4
Some heart thou foundest rich and leftest bare	Z
Choking its well of faith with thy false deeds	V2
Not like thy God who keeps the better wine	C2
Until the last and if He giveth grief	M3
Giveth it first and ends the tale with joy	N
Madness is nearer God than thou go mad	F4
And be ennobled far above thyself	M3
Her brain was ill her heart was well she loved	F4
It was the unbroken cord between the twain	C2
That drew her ever to the ocean marge	W4
Though to her feverous phantasy unfit	F4
'Mid the tumultuous brood of shapes distort	F4
To see one simple form it was the fear	N2
Of fixed destiny unavoidable	K
And not the longing for the well known face	V2
That drew her drew her to the urgent sea	V2
Better to die better to rave for love	M3
Than to recover with sick sneering heart	F4
	-
Or if that thou art noble in some hour	G2
Maddened with thoughts of that which could not be	V2
Thou mightst have yielded to the burning wind	F4
That swept in tempest through thy scorching brain	C2
And rushed into the thick cold night of the earth	R4
And clamoured to the waves and beat the rocks	V2
And never found the way back to the seat	F4
Of conscious rule and power to bear thy pain	C2
But God had made thee stronger to endure	X4
For other ends beyond thy present choice	V2
Wilt thou not own her story a fit theme	B4
For poet's tale in her most frantic mood	F4
Not call the maniac sister tenderly	V2
For she went mad for love and not for gold	F4
And in the faded form whose eyes like suns	V2
Too fierce for freshness and for dewy bloom	B4
Have parched and paled the hues of tender spring	X3
Cannot thy love unmask a youthful shape	Y4
Deformed by tempests of the soul and sea	V2
Fit to remind thee of a story old	F4
Which God has in his keeping of thyself	M3
	-
But God forgets not men because they sleep	R3
The darkness lasts all night and clears the eyes	V2
Then comes the morning and the joy of light	F4
O surely madness hideth not from Him	B4
Nor doth a soul cease to be beautiful	K
In His sight when its beauty is withdrawn	C2
And hid by pale eclipse from human eyes	V2
Surely as snow is friendly to the spring	X3
A madness may be friendly to the soul	K
And shield it from a more enduring loss	V2
From the ice spears of a heart reaching frost	F4
So after years the winter of her life	M3
Came the sure spring to her men had forgot	F4
Closing the rent links of the social chain	C2
And leaving her outside their charmed ring	X3
Into the chill wind and the howling night	F4
God sent out for her and she entered in	C2
Where there was no more sea What messengers	V2
Ran from the door of love contented heaven	C2
To lead her towards the real ideal home	B4
The sea her terror and the wintry wind	F4
For on a morn of sunshine while the wind	F4
Yet blew and heaved yet the billowy sea	V2
With memories of the night of deep unrest	F4
They found her in a basin of the rocks	V2
Which buried in a firmament of sea	V2
When ocean winds heap up the tidal waves	V2
Yet in the respiration of the surge	K4
Lifts clear its edge of rock full to the brim	B4
With deep clear resting water plentiful	K
There in the blessedness of sleep which God	F4
Gives his beloved she lay drowned and still	K
O life of love conquered at last by fate	F4
O life raised from the dead by Saviour Death	J4
O love unconquered and invincible	K
The sea had cooled the burning of that brain	C2
Had laid to rest those limbs so fever tense	V2
That scarce relaxed in sleep and now she lies	V2
Sleeping the sleep that follows after pain	C2
'Twas one night more of agony and fear	N2
Of shrinking from the onset of the sea	V2
One cry of desolation when her fear	N2
Became a fact and then God knows the rest	F4
O cure of all our miseries God knows	V2
	-
O thou whose feet tread ever the wet sands	V2
And howling rocks along the wearing shore	R
Roaming the confines of the endless sea	V2
Strain not thine eyes across bedimmed with tears	V2
No sail comes back across that tender line	C2
Turn thee unto thy work let God alone	C2
He will do his part Then across the waves	V2
Will float faint whispers from the better land	F4
Veiled in the dust of waters we call storms	V2
To thine averted ears Do thou thy work	X3
And thou shalt follow follow and find thine own	C2
	-
O thou who liv'st in fear of the To come	B4
Around whose house the storm of terror breaks	V2
All night to whose love sharpened ear all day	F4
The Invisible is calling at thy door	R
To render up that which thou can'st not keep	R3
Be it a life or love Open thy door	R
And carry forth thy dead unto the marge	W4
Of the great sea bear it into the flood	F4
Braving the cold that creepeth to thy heart	F4
And lay thy coffin as an ark of hope	Z4
Upon the billows of the infinite sea	V2
Give God thy dead to keep so float it back	X3
With sighs and prayers to waft it through the dark	X3
Back to the spring of life Say It is dead	F4
But thou the life of life art yet alive	M3
And thou can'st give the dead its dear old life	M3
With new abundance perfecting the old	F4
God see my sadness feel it in thyself	M3
	-
Ah God the earth is full of cries and moans	V2
And dull despair that neither moans nor cries	V2
Thousands of hearts are waiting the last day	F4
For what they know not but with hope of change
Of resurrection or of dreamless death	J4
Raise thou the buried dead of springs gone by	X3
In maidens' bosoms raise the autumn fruits	V2
Of old men feebly mournful o'er the life	M3
Which scarce hath memory but the mournfulness	V2
There is no Past with thee bring back once more	R
The summer eves of lovers over which
The wintry wind that raveth through the world	F4
Heaps wretched leaves half tombed in ghastly snow	C2
Bring back the mother heaven of orphans lone	C2
The brother's and the sister's faithfulness	V2
Bring forth the kingdom of the Son of Man	C2
	-
They troop around me children wildly crying	X3
Women with faded eyes all spent of tears	V2
Men who have lived for love yet lived alone	C2
And worse than so whose grief cannot be said	F4
O God thou hast a work to do indeed	F4
To save these hearts of thine with full content	F4
Except thou give them Lethe's stream to drink	X3
And that my God were all unworthy thee	V2
	-
Dome up O Heaven yet higher o'er my head	F4
Back back horizon widen out my world	F4
Rush in O infinite sea of the Unknown	C2
For though he slay me I will trust in God	F4

George Macdonald

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