She sat on the rocks -- her fireless eyes,
Teased and tired with the thoughts of yore,
And paining her sense were alien skies,
An alien sea and an alien shore.
In gold-green dusks she glimpsed new flowers,
And the glittering wings of gleaming birds,
But haunting her still were English bowers,
And the clinging sweetness of old love-words.
A soft breeze murmured of unknown shores,
And laughed as it touched her with fingers light,
But she mourned the more for the wind that roars,
Down sullen coasts on a northern night.
Like topaz gems on a sable dome,
The stranger stars stole shyly forth,
She saw no stars like the stars of home,
That burn white-fired in the frosty north.
A restless sea was at her feet,
A restless sea of darkest blue,
The lights burned dimly on the Fleet,
And these were all the ships it knew.
She watched the dark tides rise and fall,
The lion-tides that night and noon
Range round the world and moan and call
In sad sea-voices to the moon.
Through hour and hour they ebbed and flowed,
Till last with sudden splendor day
Lit all the scene with gold and showed
An arrow black on a garb of grey.
First published in The Bulletin, 27 March 1897
Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian Poetry Library
See also.
Teased and tired with the thoughts of yore,
And paining her sense were alien skies,
An alien sea and an alien shore.
In gold-green dusks she glimpsed new flowers,
And the glittering wings of gleaming birds,
But haunting her still were English bowers,
And the clinging sweetness of old love-words.
A soft breeze murmured of unknown shores,
And laughed as it touched her with fingers light,
But she mourned the more for the wind that roars,
Down sullen coasts on a northern night.
Like topaz gems on a sable dome,
The stranger stars stole shyly forth,
She saw no stars like the stars of home,
That burn white-fired in the frosty north.
A restless sea was at her feet,
A restless sea of darkest blue,
The lights burned dimly on the Fleet,
And these were all the ships it knew.
She watched the dark tides rise and fall,
The lion-tides that night and noon
Range round the world and moan and call
In sad sea-voices to the moon.
Through hour and hour they ebbed and flowed,
Till last with sudden splendor day
Lit all the scene with gold and showed
An arrow black on a garb of grey.
First published in The Bulletin, 27 March 1897
Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian Poetry Library
See also.
