Explore "Stranded" by Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
O busy ships! that smile in sailing / In a glory / Like a dream, / From the colors of the harbor to the colors of the sea. / In singing words or in bewailing, / Tell the story / As you gleam, / Tell the story, guess the language of my idle hours for me.
O busy waves! so blest in bruising / Your white faces / On the shore. / So happy to be wasted with the purpose of the sea, / Content to leave with it the choosing / Of your places / Evermore, / Whisper but the far sea-meaning of my stranded life for me.
Gray the sails grow in departing / Like fleet swallows / To the South. / Stern the tide turns in its parting, / As it follows / With dumb mouth. / In the stillness and the sternness God makes answer unto me.