George Sterling
The Fog-Sea
I
The morning is ten thousand miles away.
The winter night surrounds me, vast and cold,
Without a star. The voiceless fog is rolled
From ocean-levels desolate and grey;
But over all the floods of moonlight lay
A glory on those billows that enfold
The muffled sea and forest. Gaunt and old,
The dripping redwoods wait the distant day.
Unknown, above, what silver-dripping waves
Break slowly on the purple reefs of night!
What radiant foam ascends from shadowy bars,
Or sinks unechoing to soundless caves!
No whisper is upon those tides of light,
Setting in silence toward the risen stars.
II
O phantom sea, pale spirit of unrest!
There is no thunder where your billows break.
Morning shall be your strand; your waters make
An island of the mountain-top, whose crest
Is lonely on the ocean of your breast.
No sail is there save what our visions take
Of mist and moonlight, on whose ghostly wake
Our dreams go forth unuttered to the West.
The splendour on your tides is high and far,
Seen by the mind alone, whose wings can sweep
On wilder glories and a vaster deep.
Chill are your gulfs, O sea without a song!
Hiding the heavens from man, man from the star,
To which your parent sea endures as long.
(Text from
The Best Poems of 1923
)
