Explore "Gulls" by Virna Sheard on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
When the mist drives past and the wind blows high, / And the harbour lights are dim -- / See where they circle, and dip and fly, / The grey free-lances of wind and sky, / To the water's distant rim!
Like spirits possessed of a fierce delight, / A courage that cannot fail, / They face the breakers -- they face the night -- / The mad storm-horses are silvery white, / They ride through the bitter gale!
They seem like the souls of the long, long lost, / Who breasted the ocean-main -- / Vikings whose vessels were tempest-tossed, / Voyagers who sailed, whatever the cost, / And never came home again.
Or stranger and wilder fancy -- it seems / As I hear their wind-torn cry, / No birds fly there through the sun's last gleams, / But the wraiths of hopes -- the ghosts of dreams / That the old sea-gods saw die.
When the mist drives past and the wind blows high, / And the harbour lights are dim -- / See where they circle, and dip and fly, / The grey free-lances of wind and sky, / To the far horizon's rim.