Sea Creatures

The Sea called--I lay on the rocks and said:
"I am come."
She mocked and showed her teeth,
Stretching out her long green arms.
"Go away!" she thundered.
"Then tell me what I am to do," I begged.
"If I leave you, you will not be silent,
But cry my name in the cities
And wistfully entreat me in the plains and forests;
All else I forsake to come to you--what must I do?"
"Never have I uttered your name," snarled the Sea.
"There is no more of me in your body
Than the little salt tears you are frightened of shedding.
What can you know of my love on your brown rock pillow....
Come closer."

Now the dancing sunbeams play
On the green and glassy sea,
Come, and I will lead the way
Where the pearly treasures be.

Come with me, and we will go
Where the rocks of coral grow.
Follow, follow, follow me.

Come, behold what treasures lie
Far below the rolling waves,
Riches, hid from human eye,
Dimly shine in ocean's caves.
Ebbing tides bear no delay,
Stormy winds are far away.

Come with me, and we will go
Where the rocks of coral grow.
Follow, follow, follow me.

I would bathe in the sky's blue,
I would overflow the world with my laughter and my love,
I would vanish like a circle upon the water.

But I would not move
To accomplish these—
Or any other
Things.

The sea is never still.
It pounds on the shore
Restless as a young heart,
Hunting.

The sea speaks
And only the stormy hearts
Know what it says:
It is the face
of a rough mother speaking.

The sea is young.
One storm cleans all the hoar
And loosens the age of it.
I hear it laughing, reckless.

They love the sea,
Men who ride on it
And know they will die
Under the salt of it.

Let only the young come,
Says the sea.
Let them kiss my face
And hear me.
I am the last word
And I tell
Where storms and stars come from.

Baby gulls who cannot walk,
Whose feathers are ungrown,
Hop to tufts of camomile
From lattices of stone.

The wind smoothes where the back dips
Wings of shaded straw;
Blue and coral-banded shells
Stick between each claw.

Tumbling with the grace of seals
From the far spit of land,
They scurry from their own wide beaks
Reflected on the sand.

The world below the brine, 
Forests at the bottom of the sea, the branches and leaves,
Sea-lettuce, vast lichens, strange flowers and seeds, 
      the thick tangle, openings, and pink turf, 
Different colors, pale gray and green, purple, white, and gold, 
       the play of light through the water, 
Dumb swimmers there among the rocks, coral, 
      gluten, grass, rushes, and the aliment of the swimmers. 
Sluggish existences grazing there suspended, 
       or slowly crawling close to the bottom, 
The sperm-whale at the surface blowing air and spray, 
       or disporting with his flukes. 
The leaden-eyed shark, the walrus, the turtle, 
     the hairy sea-leopard, and the sting-ray. 
Passions there, wars, pursuits, tribes, sight in those ocean-depths, 
breathing that thick-breathing air, as so many do. 
The change thence to the sight here, 
      and to the subtle air breathed by beings like us who walk this sphere. 
The change onward from ours to that of beings who walk other spheres. 

These wet rocks where the tide has been,
Barnacled white and weeded brown,
And slimed beneath to a beautiful green,
These wet rocks where the tide went down

Will show again when the tide is high,
Faint and perilous, far from shore,
No place to dream, but a place to die,
The bottom of the sea once more.

There was a child that wandered through
A giant's empty house all day.
House full of wonderful things and new --
But no fit place for a child to play.

Softly the sea
With its handfuls of moonlight,
Taking them in to the beach dusk,
Sifting them over the dark sand
Slowly in wide curves.

Softly and slowly the sea
Scattering moon-bubbles—
Handfuls and armfuls
On dusk-darkened beaches
Over and over—
Telling stories of moon-spray
And night-dripping wings
Over and over and over.

And the sand says nothing;
The sand remembers
And crouches and waits.
It is old as the old sea,
And knows no peace
Till the width of the low tide.