A New Song about the Sea.

    From Amberley to Storrington,
    From Storrington to Amberley,
    From Amberley to Washington
    You cannot see or smell the sea.
        But why the devil should you wish
        To see the home of silly fish?

    Since I prefer the earth and air,
    The fish may wallow in the sea
    And live the life that they prefer,
    If they will leave the land to me,
        So wish for each what he may wish,
        The earth for me, the sea for fish.

Edward Shanks

Edward Shanks was an English writer, poet, and novelist, known for his literary contributions during the early 20th century. Born on June 11, 1892, in London, Shanks attended Cambridge University where he was a member of the 'War Poets' of World War I. His works reflect the turmoil and changes of his time. Besides poetry, he wrote novels, essays, and book reviews, contributing significantly to English literature. He passed away on May 4, 1953.

Edward Shanks

Sonnets on Separation IV.

Edward Shanks, Simple Poetry

The Pursuit of Daphne.

Edward Shanks, Simple Poetry

Bramber.

Edward Shanks, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

By the Sea.

I am longing to dwell by the sea,
    And dip in the surf every day,
And - height of subaqueous glee -
    With the sharks and the porpoises play.

To novelty ever inclined -
    Instead of a calm evening sail,
'Twould suit my adventurous mind
    To ride on the back of a whale.

I want to disport on the rocks
    Like a mythical mermaiden belle,
And comb out my watery locks,
    Then dive to my cavernous cell.

I want to discover what lends
    Such terror to all timid folks -
That serpent whose mystery tends
    To make one believe it a hoax.

They say he's been captured at last;
    The news is too good to be true -
He's slippery, cunning, and fast,
    And likes notoriety too.

Once had I such longings to be

Hattie Howard

The Rock Pool

This is the sea. In these uneven walls
    A wave lies prisoned. Far and far away
Outward to ocean, as the slow tide falls,
    Her sisters through the capes that hold the bay
Dancing in lovely liberty recede.
    Yet lovely in captivity she lies,
Filled with soft colours, where the wavering weed
    Moves gently and discloses to our eyes
Blurred shining veins of rock and lucent shells
    Under the light-shot water; and here repose
Small quiet fish and dimly glowing bells
    Of sleeping sea-anemones that close
Their tender fronds and will not now awake
Till on these rocks the waves returning break.

Edward Shanks

A Sea Dirge

There are certain things, as, a spider, a ghost,
The income-tax, gout, an umbrella for three,
That I hate, but the thing that I hate the most
Is a thing they call the Sea.

Pour some salt water over the floor,
Ugly I'm sure you'll allow it to be:
Suppose it extended a mile or more,
That's very like the Sea.

Beat a dog till it howls outright,
Cruel, but all very well for a spree:
Suppose that he did so day and night,
That would be like the Sea.

I had a vision of nursery-maids;
Tens of thousands passed by me,
All leading children with wooden spades,
And this was by the Sea.

Who invented those spades of wood?
Who was it cut them out of the tree?
None, I think, but an idiot could,
Or one that loved the Sea.

It is pl...

Lewis Carroll

A Ballad at Parting

Sea to sea that clasps and fosters England, uttering ever-more
Song eterne and praise immortal of the indomitable shore,
Lifts aloud her constant heart up, south to north and east to west,
Here in speech that shames all music, there in thunder-throated roar,
Chiming concord out of discord, waking rapture out of rest.
All her ways are lovely, all her works and symbols are divine,
Yet shall man love best what first bade leap his heart and bend his knee;
Yet where first his whole soul worshipped shall his soul set up her shrine:
Nor may love not know the lovelier, fair as both beheld may be,
Here the limitless north-eastern, there the strait south-western sea.
Though their chant bear all one burden, as ere man was born it bore;
Though the burden be diviner than the songs all souls adore;...

Algernon Charles Swinburne

The Englishman

I met a sailor in the woods,
    A silver ring wore he,
His hair hung black, his eyes shone blue,
    And thus he said to me: -

'What country, say, of this round earth,
    What shore of what salt sea,
Be this, my son, I wander in,
    And looks so strange to me?'

Says I, 'O foreign sailorman,
    In England now you be,
This is her wood, and this her sky,
    And that her roaring sea.'

He lifts his voice yet louder,
    'What smell be this,' says he,
'My nose on the sharp morning air
    Snuffs up so greedily?'

Says I, 'It is wild roses
    Do smell so winsomely,
And winy briar too,' says I,
    'That in these thickets be.'

'And oh!' says he, 'what leetle bird
    Is singing in yon high tree,
So every...

Walter De La Mare

Sam

When Sam goes back in memory,
    It is to where the sea
Breaks on the shingle, emerald-green,
    In white foam, endlessly;
He says - with small brown eye on mine -
    "I used to keep awake,
And lean from my window in the moon,
    Watching those billows break.
And half a million tiny hands,
    And eyes, like sparks of frost,
Would dance and come tumbling into the moon,
    On every breaker tossed.
And all across from star to star,
    I've seen the watery sea,
With not a single ship in sight,
    Just ocean there, and me;
And heard my father snore. And once,
    As sure as I'm alive,
Out of those wallowing, moon-flecked waves
    I saw a mermaid dive;
Head and shoulders above the wave,
    Plain as I now see you,
Combing her h...

Walter De La Mare