I hear the deep voice of the sea,
As slowly it breaks on the shore,
With the self-same tone
To my childhood known—
Its music for evermore!
How sublimely its accents fall
And pierce each recess of the soul,
Recalling the past
With a trumpet’s blast,
And a might beyond control!
It tells of the gay infant hours
When I play’d on the sun-lit sand,
Whilst each shell and stone
Was a wealth unknown,
And the beach a fairy-land.
It speaks of the wild boyish days
When I roam’d to the rocks afar,
Where the black sea-weed
Cracks loud to the tread,
And shell-fish in thousand are.
All times on my spirit come back
When I’ve dwelt by thy shore, O sea;
Each friend I have known,
Each look and each tone,
Now cruelly reft from me.
Thy voice is the voice of a dirge,
And mournfully sighs for the dead;
Sound on, then, thy knell,
Like a funeral bell,
For the loved who from earth have fled.
Yet Hope seems to sweeten the sound,
Bright Faith, and her sister Love;
For whilst on thy brink,
I cheerfully think,
Of the calm blue heavens above!