A Swimmer's Dream

Somno mollior unda I     Dawn is dim on the dark soft water,     Soft and passionate, dark and sweet.     Love's own self was the deep sea's daughter,     Fair and flawless from face to feet,     Hailed of all when the world was golden,     Loved of lovers whose names beholden     Thrill men's eyes as with light of olden     Days more glad than their flight was fleet.     So they sang: but for men that love her,     Souls that hear not her word in vain,     Earth beside her and heaven above her     Seem but shadows that wax and wane.     Softer than sleep's are the sea's caresses,     Kinder than love's that betrays and blesses,     Blither than spring's when her flowerful tresses     Shake forth sunlight and shine with rain.     All the strength of the waves that perish     Swells beneath me and laughs and sighs,     Sighs for love of the life they cherish,     Laughs to know that it lives and dies,     Dies for joy of its life, and lives     Thrilled with joy that its brief death gives     Death whose laugh or whose breath forgives     Change that bids it subside and rise. II     Hard and heavy, remote but nearing,     Sunless hangs the severe sky's weight,     Cloud on cloud, though the wind be veering     Heaped on high to the sundawn's gate.     Dawn and even and noon are one,     Veiled with vapour and void of sun;     Nought in sight or in fancied hearing     Now less mighty than time or fate.     The grey sky gleams and the grey seas glimmer,     Pale and sweet as a dream's delight,     As a dream's where darkness and light seem dimmer,     Touched by dawn or subdued by night.     The dark wind, stern and sublime and sad,     Swings the rollers to westward, clad     With lustrous shadow that lures the swimmer,     Lures and lulls him with dreams of light.     Light, and sleep, and delight, and wonder,     Change, and rest, and a charm of cloud,     Fill the world of the skies whereunder     Heaves and quivers and pants aloud     All the world of the waters, hoary     Now, but clothed with its own live glory,     That mates the lightning and mocks the thunder     With light more living and word more proud. III     Far off westward, whither sets the sounding strife,     Strife more sweet than peace, of shoreless waves whose glee     Scorns the shore and loves the wind that leaves them free,     Strange as sleep and pale as death and fair as life,     Shifts the moonlight-coloured sunshine on the sea.     Toward the sunset's goal the sunless waters crowd,     Fast as autumn days toward winter: yet it seems     Here that autumn wanes not, here that woods and streams     Lose not heart and change not likeness, chilled and bowed,     Warped and wrinkled: here the days are fair as dreams. IV     O russet-robed November,     What ails thee so to smile?     Chill August, pale September,     Endured a woful while,     And fell as falls an ember     From forth a flameless pile:     But golden-girt November     Bids all she looks on smile.     The lustrous foliage, waning     As wanes the morning moon,     Here falling, here refraining,     Outbraves the pride of June     With statelier semblance, feigning     No fear lest death be soon:     As though the woods thus waning     Should wax to meet the moon.     As though, when fields lie stricken     By grey December's breath,     These lordlier growths that sicken     And die for fear of death     Should feel the sense requicken     That hears what springtide saith     And thrills for love, spring-stricken     And pierced with April's breath.     The keen white-winged north-easter     That stings and spurs thy sea     Doth yet but feed and feast her     With glowing sense of glee:     Calm chained her, storm released her,     And storm's glad voice was he:     South-wester or north-easter,     Thy winds rejoice the sea. V     A dream, a dream is it allthe season,     The sky, the water, the wind, the shore?     A day-born dream of divine unreason,     A marvel moulded of sleepno more?     For the cloudlike wave that my limbs while cleaving     Feel as in slumber beneath them heaving     Soothes the sense as to slumber, leaving     Sense of nought that was known of yore.     A purer passion, a lordlier leisure,     A peace more happy than lives on land,     Fulfils with pulse of diviner pleasure     The dreaming head and the steering hand.     I lean my cheek to the cold grey pillow,     The deep soft swell of the full broad billow,     And close mine eyes for delight past measure,     And wish the wheel of the world would stand.     The wild-winged hour that we fain would capture     Falls as from heaven that its light feet clomb,     So brief, so soft, and so full the rapture     Was felt that soothed me with sense of home.     To sleep, to swim, and to dream, for ever     Such joy the vision of man saw never;     For here too soon will a dark day sever     The sea-bird's wing from the sea-wave's foam.     A dream, and more than a dream, and dimmer     At once and brighter than dreams that flee,     The moment's joy of the seaward swimmer     Abides, remembered as truth may be.     Not all the joy and not all the glory     Must fade as leaves when the woods wax hoary;     For there the downs and the sea-banks glimmer,     And here to south of them swells the sea.