Keeper Of The Light
Aloft within the beacon tower alone
She trims the lamps that send their luminous beams
Far out into the night. The eerie moan
Of the wild shoal is smothered by the screams
Of winds that make the thrumming walls resound
With deafening din. She listens, mute with dread,
To voices mingling vaguely in the sound
Of the storm maddened waves, and shakes her head.
“Is it the waves?” she mutters. Bent and old
Her fingers tremble so,—but not from cold!
Her husband tosses on his cot below
Burning with fever, often calls her name.
But she must stand his watch though none may know
Of her long vigil. Vestal of a flame
Whose warning beams guide mariners aright
Mid perilous reefs, through all engulfing gloom
Though unclean spirits rage throughout the night
Riding the furious winds in rain and spume,
No matter if she shivers and turns pale,
Her courage, like her light, endures the gale.
But what drives hard like spray against the glass
Hurtling from out the dark? a tiny form
With battered wings, a tern which flees, alas,
Like some lost soul from the pursuing storm
Dashed to the rocks below. “Dear God!” she cries
“Why must my light that points great ships the way
“Be blooded by his piteous sacrifice?
“Life saving beams, who gave them power to slay?
“How hopelessly must good and evil blend
“When harmless birds meet such a cruel end.”