GAZE not at me, my poor unhappy bird; | |
| That sorrow is more than human in thine eye; | |
| Too deep already is my spirit stirred | |
| To see thee here, child of the sea and sky, | |
| Cooped in a cage with food thou canst not eat, | 5 |
| Thy “snow-flake” soiled, and soiled those conquering feet | |
| That walked the billows, while thy “sweet-sweet-sweet” | |
| Proclaimed the tempest nigh. | |
| |
| Bird whom I welcomed while the sailors cursed, | |
| Friend whom I blessed wherever keels may roam, | 10 |
| Prince of my childish dreams, whom mermaids nursed | |
| In purple of billows—silver of ocean-foam, | |
| Abashed I stand before the mighty grief | |
| That quells all other: Sorrow’s king and chief: | |
| To ride the wind and hold the sea in fief, | 15 |
| Then find a cage for home! | |
| |
| From out thy jail thou seest yon heath and woods, | |
| But canst thou hear the birds or smell the flowers? | |
| Ah, no! those rain-drops twinkling on the buds | |
| Bring only visions of the salt sea-showers. | 20 |
| “The sea!” the linnets pipe from hedge and heath; | |
| “The sea!” the honeysuckles whisper and breathe; | |
| And tumbling waves, where those wild-roses wreathe, | |
| Murmur from inland bowers. | |
| |
| These winds so soft to others,—how they burn! | 25 |
| The mavis sings with gurgle and ripple and plash, | |
| To thee yon swallow seems a wheeling tern. | |
| And when the rain recalls the briny lash, | |
| Old Ocean’s kiss thou lovest,—when thy sight | |
| Is mocked with Ocean’s horses—manes of white, | 30 |
| The long and shadowy flanks, the shoulders bright— | |
| Bright as the lightning’s flash,— | |
| |
| When all these scents of heather and brier and whin, | |
| All kindly breaths of land-shrub, flower, and vine, | |
| Recall the sea-scents, till thy feathered skin | 35 |
| Tingles in answer to a dream of brine,— | |
| When thou, remembering there thy royal birth, | |
| Dost see between the bars a world of dearth, | |
| Is there a grief—a grief on all the earth— | |
| So heavy and dark as thine? | 40 |
| |
| But I can buy thy freedom—I (thank God!), | |
| Who loved thee more than albatross or gull, | |
| Loved thee when on the waves thy footsteps trod, | |
| Dreamed of thee when, becalmed, we lay ahull— | |
| ’T is I thy friend who once, a child of six, | 45 |
| To find where Mother Carey fed her chicks, | |
| Climbed up the stranded punt, and with two sticks | |
| Tried all in vain to scull,— | |
| |
| Thy friend who owed a Paradise of Storm,— | |
| The little dreamer of the cliffs and coves, | 50 |
| Who knew thy mother, saw her shadowy form | |
| Behind the cloudy bastions where she moves, | |
| And heard her call: “Come! for the welkin thickens, | |
| And tempests mutter and the lightning quickens!” | |
| Then, starting from his dream, would find the chickens | 55 |
| Were only blue rock-doves,— | |
| |
| Thy friend who owed another Paradise | |
| Of calmer air, a floating isle of fruit, | |
| Where sang the Nereids on a breeze of spice | |
| While Triton, from afar, would sound salute: | 60 |
| There wast thou winging, though the skies were calm, | |
| For marvellous strains, as of the morning’s shalm, | |
| Were struck by ripples round that isle of palm | |
| Whose shores were “Carey’s lute.” | |
| |
| And now to see thee here, my king, my king, | 65 |
| Far-glittering memories mirrored in those eyes, | |
| As if there shone within each iris-ring | |
| An orbèd world—ocean and hills and skies!— | |
| Those black wings ruffled whose triumphant sweep | |
| Conquered in sport!—yea, up the glimmering steep | 70 |
| Of highest billow, down the deepest deep, | |
| Sported with victories! | |
| |
| To see thee here!—a coil of wilted weeds | |
| Beneath those feet that danced on diamond spray, | |
| Rider of sportive Ocean’s reinless steeds— | 75 |
| Winner in Mother Carey’s sabbath-fray | |
| When, stung by magic of the witch’s chant, | |
| They rise, each foamy-crested combatant— | |
| They rise and fall and leap and foam and gallop and pant | |
| Till albatross, sea-swallow, and cormorant | 80 |
| Would flee like doves away! | |
| |
| And shalt thou ride no more where thou hast ridden, | |
| And feast no more in hyaline halls and caves, | |
| Master of Mother Carey’s secrets hidden, | |
| Master most equal of the wind and waves, | 85 |
| Who never, save in stress of angriest blast, | |
| Asked ship for shelter,—never, till at last | |
| The foam-flakes, hurled against the sloping masts, | |
| Slashed thee like whirling glaives! | |
| |
| Right home to fields no seamew ever kenned, | 90 |
| Where scarce the great sea-wanderer fares with thee, | |
| I come to take thee—nay, ’t is I, thy friend— | |
| Ah, tremble not—I come to set thee free; | |
| I come to tear this cage from off this wall, | |
| And take thee hence to that fierce festival | 95 |
| Where billows march and winds are musical, | |
| Hymning the Victor-Sea! * * * * * | |
| Yea, lift thine eyes, my own can bear them now: | |
| Thou ’rt free! thou ’rt free. Ah, surely a bird can smile! | |
| Dost know me, Petrel? Dost remember how | 100 |
| I fed thee in the wake for many a mile, | |
| Whilst thou wouldst pat the waves, then, rising, take | |
| The morsel up and wheel about the wake? | |
| Thou ’rt free, thou ’rt free, but for thine own dear sake | |
| I keep thee caged awhile. | 105 |
| |
| Away to sea! no matter where the coast: | |
| The road that turns to home turns never wrong: | |
| Where waves run high my bird will not be lost: | |
| His home I know: ’t is where the winds are strong,— | |
| Where, on her throne of billows, rolling hoary | 110 |
| And green and blue and splashed with sunny glory, | |
| Far, far from shore—from farthest promontory— | |
| The mighty Mother sings the triumphs of her story, | |
| Sings to my bird the song! | |
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