Give Me Freshening Breeze, My Boys

    'Give me freshening breeze, my boys,
    A white and swelling sail,
    A ship that cuts the dashing waves,
    And weathers every gale.
    What life is like a sailor's life,
    So free, so bold, so brave?
    His home the ocean's wide expanse,
    A coral bed his grave.'

Louisa May Alcott

Louisa May Alcott was an American novelist and poet best known as the author of the novel 'Little Women' and its sequels 'Little Men' and 'Jo's Boys.' Born in Germantown, Pennsylvania, she grew up in Massachusetts. She was an abolitionist and a feminist and was active in both the Transcendentalist and suffragist movements. Alcott began writing to support her family and went on to publish numerous works that have had a lasting impact on American literature.

Louisa May Alcott

A Little Grey Curl

Louisa May Alcott, Simple Poetry

My Beth

Louisa May Alcott, Simple Poetry

Welcome, Maids Of Honor

Louisa May Alcott, Simple Poetry

'Y' Are The Maiden Posies

Louisa May Alcott, 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.

Sailor's Song.

The sea goes up; the sky comes down.
Oh, can you spy the ancient town, -
The granite hills so hard and gray,
That rib the land behind the bay?
    O ye ho, boys! Spread her wings!
    Fair winds, boys: send her home!
    O ye ho!

Three years? Is it so long that we
Have lived upon the lonely sea?
Oh, often I thought we'd see the town,
When the sea went up, and the sky came down.
    O ye ho, boys! Spread her wings!
    Fair winds, boys: send her home!
    O ye ho!

Even the winter winds would rouse
A memory of my father's house;
For round his windows and his door
They made the same deep, mouthless roar.
    O ye ho, boys! Spread her wings!
    Fair winds, boys: send her home!
    O ye ho!

And when the summer's breezes b...

George Parsons Lathrop

The Shipbuilders

The sky is ruddy in the east,
The earth is gray below,
And, spectral in the river-mist,
The ships white timbers show.
Then let the sounds of measured stroke
And grating saw begin;
The broad-axe to the gnarlèd oak,
The mallet to the pin!

Hark! roars the bellows, blast on blast,
The sooty smithy jars,
And fire-sparks, rising far and fast,
Are fading with the stars.
All day for us the smith shall stand
Beside that flashing forge;
All day for us his heavy hand
The groaning anvil scourge.

From far-off hills, the panting team
For us is toiling near;
For us the raftsmen down the stream
Their island barges steer.
Rings out for us the axe-mans stroke
In forests old and still,
For us the century-circled oak
Falls crashing...

John Greenleaf Whittier

Up, Sailor Boy, 'Tis Day.

Up, sailor boy, 'tis day!
    The west wind blowing,
    The spring tide flowing,
Summon thee hence away.
Didst thou not hear yon soaring swallow sing?
Chirp, chirp,--in every note he seemed to say
'Tis Spring, 'tis Spring.
Up boy, away,--
Who'd stay on land to-day?
    The very flowers
    Would from their bowers
Delight to wing away!

Leave languid youths to pine
    On silken pillows;
    But be the billows
Of the great deep thine.
Hark, to the sail the breeze sings, "Let us fly;"
While soft the sail, replying to the breeze,
Says, with a yielding sigh,
"Yes, where you; please."
Up, boy, the wind, the ray,
    The blue sky o'er thee,
    The deep before thee,
All cry aloud, "Away!"

Thomas Moore

Sailor's Song, Returning

The sea goes up; the sky comes down.
Oh, can you spy the ancient town, -
The granite hills so green and gray,
That rib the land behind the bay?
O ye ho, boys. Spread her wings!
Fair winds, boys: send her home!
                O ye ho!

Three years? Is it so long that we
Have lived upon the lonely sea?
Oh, often I thought we'd see the town,
When the sea went up, and the sky came down.
O ye ho, boys. Spread her wings!

Even the winter winds would rouse
A memory of my father's house;
For round his windows and his door
They made the same deep, mouthless roar.
O ye ho, boys. Spread her wings!

And when the summer's breezes beat,
Methought I saw the sunny street
Where stood my Kate. Beneath her hand
She gazed far out, far out from ...

George Parsons Lathrop

The Ideal and the Actual.

My boat is on the bounding tide,
Away, away from surge and shore;
A waif upon the wave I ride,
Without a rudder or an oar.

Blow as ye list, ye breezes, blow
The compass now is nought to me;
Flow as ye will, ye billows, flow,
If but ye bear me out to sea.

Yon waving line of dusky blue,
Where care and toil oppress the heart
To thee I bid a long adieu,
And smile to feel that thus we part.

There let the sweating ploughman toil,
The yearning miser count his gain,
The fevered scholar waste his oil,
But I am bounding o'er the main!

How fresh these breezes to the brow
How dear this freedom to the soul;
Bright ocean, I am with thee now,
So let thy golden billows roll!

* * * * *

But stay what means this throbb...

Samuel Griswold Goodrich

The Fishermen

Hurrah! the seaward breezes
Sweep down the bay amain;
Heave up, my lads, the anchor!
Run up the sail again!
Leave to the lubber landsmen
The rail-car and the steed;
The stars of heaven shall guide us,
The breath of heaven shall speed.
From the hill-top looks the steeple,
And the lighthouse from the sand;
And the scattered pines are waving
Their farewell from the land.
One glance, my lads, behind us,
For the homes we leave one sigh,
Ere we take the change and chances
Of the ocean and the sky.
Now, brothers, for the icebergs
Of frozen Labrador,
Floating spectral in the moonshine,
Along the low, black shore!
Where like snow the gannet's feathers
On Brador's rocks are shed,
And the noisy murr are flying,
Like black scuds, overhea...

John Greenleaf Whittier