A Swimmer's Dream

Somno mollior unda

IDawn is dim on the dark soft water,Soft and passionate, dark and sweet.Love's own self was the deep sea's daughter,5Fair and flawless from face to feet,Hailed of all when the world was golden,Loved of lovers whose names beholdenThrill men's eyes as with light of oldenDays more glad than their flight was fleet.10

So they sang: but for men that love her,Souls that hear not her word in vain,Earth beside her and heaven above herSeem but shadows that wax and wane.Softer than sleep's are the sea's caresses,15Kinder than love's that betrays and blesses,Blither than spring's when her flowerful tressesShake forth sunlight and shine with rain.

All the strength of the waves that perishSwells beneath me and laughs and sighs,20Sighs for love of the life they cherish,Laughs to know that it lives and dies,Dies for joy of its life, and livesThrilled with joy that its brief death gives --Death whose laugh or whose breath forgives25Change that bids it subside and rise.

IIHard and heavy, remote but nearing,Sunless hangs the severe sky's weight,Cloud on cloud, though the wind be veering30Heaped on high to the sundawn's gate.Dawn and even and noon are one,Veiled with vapour and void of sun;Nought in sight or in fancied hearingNow less mighty than time or fate.35

The grey sky gleams and the grey seas glimmer,Pale and sweet as a dream's delight,As a dream's where darkness and light seem dimmer,Touched by dawn or subdued by night.The dark wind, stern and sublime and sad,40Swings the rollers to westward, cladWith lustrous shadow that lures the swimmer,Lures and lulls him with dreams of light.

Light, and sleep, and delight, and wonder,Change, and rest, and a charm of cloud,45Fill the world of the skies whereunderHeaves and quivers and pants aloudAll the world of the waters, hoaryNow, but clothed with its own live glory,That mates the lightning and mocks the thunder50With light more living and word more proud.

IIIFar off westward, whither sets the sounding strife,Strife more sweet than peace, of shoreless waves whose gleeScorns the shore and loves the wind that leaves them free,55Strange as sleep and pale as death and fair as life,Shifts the moonlight-coloured sunshine on the sea.

Toward the sunset's goal the sunless waters crowd,Fast as autumn days toward winter: yet it seemsHere that autumn wanes not, here that woods and streams60Lose not heart and change not likeness, chilled and bowed,Warped and wrinkled: here the days are fair as dreams.

IVO russet-robed November,What ails thee so to smile?65Chill August, pale September,Endured a woful while,And fell as falls an emberFrom forth a flameless pile:But golden-girt November70Bids all she looks on smile.

The lustrous foliage, waningAs wanes the morning moon,Here falling, here refraining,Outbraves the pride of June75With statelier semblance, feigningNo fear lest death be soon:As though the woods thus waningShould wax to meet the moon.

As though, when fields lie stricken80By grey December's breath,These lordlier growths that sickenAnd die for fear of deathShould feel the sense requickenThat hears what springtide saith85And thrills for love, spring-strickenAnd pierced with April's breath.

The keen white-winged north-easterThat stings and spurs thy seaDoth yet but feed and feast her90With glowing sense of glee:Calm chained her, storm released her,And storm's glad voice was he:South-wester or north-easter,Thy winds rejoice the sea.95

VA dream, a dream is it all -- the season,The sky, the water, the wind, the shore?A day-born dream of divine unreason,A marvel moulded of sleep -- no more?100For the cloudlike wave that my limbs while cleavingFeel as in slumber beneath them heavingSoothes the sense as to slumber, leavingSense of nought that was known of yore.

A purer passion, a lordlier leisure,105A peace more happy than lives on land,Fulfils with pulse of diviner pleasureThe dreaming head and the steering hand.I lean my cheek to the cold grey pillow,The deep soft swell of the full broad billow,110And close mine eyes for delight past measure,And wish the wheel of the world would stand.

The wild-winged hour that we fain would captureFalls as from heaven that its light feet clomb,So brief, so soft, and so full the rapture115Was felt that soothed me with sense of home.To sleep, to swim, and to dream, for ever --Such joy the vision of man saw never;For here too soon will a dark day severThe sea-bird's wing from the sea-wave's foam.120

A dream, and more than a dream, and dimmerAt once and brighter than dreams that flee,The moment's joy of the seaward swimmerAbides, remembered as truth may be.Not all the joy and not all the glory125Must fade as leaves when the woods wax hoary;For there the downs and the sea-banks glimmer,And here to south of them swells the sea.