When You Are On The Sea

How can I laugh or dance as others do,
        Or ply my rock or reel?
My heart will still return to dreams of you
        Beside my spinning-wheel.

My little dog he cried out in the dark,
        He would not whisht for me:
I took him to my side-why did he bark
        When you were on the sea?

I fear the red cock-if he crow to-night-
        I keep him close and warm,
Twere ill with me, if he should wake in fright
        And you out in the storm.

I dare not smile for fear my laugh would ring
        Across your dying ears;
O, if you, drifting, drowned, should hear me sing
        And think I had not tears.

I never thought the sea could wake such waves,
        Nor that such winds could be;
I never wept when other eyes grew blind
        For some one on the sea.

But now I fear and pray all things for you,
        How many dangers be!
I set my wheel aside, what can I do
        When you are on the sea?

Dora Sigerson Shorter

Dora Sigerson Shorter was an Irish poet and sculptor born in Dublin in 1866. She was one of the leading figures of the Irish Literary Revival, a movement that aimed to promote Irish literature and culture in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. She was also a close friend of W.B. Yeats and married the writer and journalist Clement King Shorter. Dora's work often dealt with themes of Irish nationalism and folklore, and she published several volumes of poetry before her untimely death in 1918.

Dora Sigerson Shorter

In A Wood

Dora Sigerson Shorter, Simple Poetry

The Blow Returned

Dora Sigerson Shorter, Simple Poetry

All Souls Eve

Dora Sigerson Shorter, Simple Poetry

The Fairy Changeling

Dora Sigerson Shorter, Simple Poetry

English

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Cean Duv Deelish

Cean duv deelish, beside the sea
I stand and stretch my hands to thee
            Across the world.
The riderless horses race to shore
With thundering hoofs and shuddering, hoar,
            Blown manes uncurled.

Cean duv deelish, I cry to thee
Beyond the world, beneath the sea,
            Thou being dead.
Where hast thou hidden from the beat
Of crushing hoofs and tearing feet
            Thy dear black head?

Cean duv deelish, tis hard to pray
With breaking heart from day to day,
            And no reply;
When the passionate challenge of sky is cast
In the teeth of the sea and an angry blast
            Goes by.

God bless the woman, whoever she be,
From the tossing waves will recover thee
            And lashing wind.

Dora Sigerson Shorter

A Vagrant Heart

O to be a woman! to be left to pique and pine,
When the winds are out and calling to this vagrant heart of mine.
Whisht! it whistles at the windows, and how can I be still?
There! the last leaves of the beech-tree go dancing down the hill.
All the boats at anchor they are plunging to be free-
O to be a sailor, and away across the sea!
When the sky is black with thunder, and the sea is white with foam,
The gray-gulls whirl up shrieking and seek their rocky home,
Low his boat is lying leeward, how she runs upon the gale,
As she rises with the billows, nor shakes her dripping sail.
There is danger on the waters-there is joy where dangers be-
Alas! to be a woman and the nomads heart in me.

Ochone! to be a woman, only sighing on the shore-
With a soul that finds a passion ...

Dora Sigerson Shorter

The Kine Of My Father

The kine of my rather, they are straying from my keeping;
        The young goats at mischief, but little can I do:
For all through the night did I hear the Banshee keening;
        O youth of my loving, and is it well with you?

All through the night sat my mother with my sorrow;
        Whisht, it is the wind, O one childeen of my heart!
My hair with the wind, and my two hands clasped in anguish;
        Black head of my darling! too long are we apart.

Were your grave at my feet, I would think it half a blessing;
        I could herd then the cattle, and drive the goats away;
Many a Paternoster I would say for your safe keeping;
        I could sleep above your heart, until the dawn of day.

I see you on the prairie, hot with thirst and faint with hunger;

Dora Sigerson Shorter

A Ballad Of Marjorie

What ails you that you look so pale,
O fisher of the sea?
Tis for a mournful tale I own,
Fair maiden Marjorie.

What is the dreary tale to tell,
O toiler of the sea?
I cast my net into the waves,
Sweet maiden Marjorie.

I cast my net into the tide,
Before I made for home;
Too heavy for my hands to raise,
I drew it through the foam.

What saw you that you look so pale,
Sad searcher of the sea?
A dead mans body from the deep
My haul had brought to me!

And was he young, and was he fair?
Oh, cruel to behold!
In his white face the joy of life
Not yet was grown a-cold.

Oh, pale you are, and full of prayer
For one who sails the sea.
Because the dead looked up and spoke,
Poor maiden Ma...

Dora Sigerson Shorter

The Sea-Bird.

Far, far o'er the deep is my island throne,
Where the sea-gull roams and reigns alone;
Where nought is seen but the beetling rock,
And nought is heard but the ocean-shock,
And the scream of birds when the storm is nigh,
And the crash of the wreck, and the fearful cry
Of drowning men, in their agony.
I love to sit, when the waters sleep,
And ponder the depths of the glassy deep,
Till I dream that I float on a corse at sea,
And sing of the feast that is made for me.
I love on the rush of the storm to sail,
And mingle my scream with the hoarser gale.
When the sky is dark, and the billow high,
When the tempest sweeps in its terror by,
I love to ride on the maddening blast
To flap my wing o'er the fated mast,
And sing to the crew a song of fear,
Of the re...

Samuel Griswold Goodrich

On The Sea Wall

I sit upon the old sea wall,
And watch the shimmering sea,
Where soft and white the moonbeams fall,
Till, in a fantasy,
Some pure white maiden's funeral pall
The strange light seems to me.

The waters break upon the shore
And shiver at my feet,
While I dream old dreams o'er and o'er,
And dim old scenes repeat;
Tho' all have dreamed the same before,
They still seem new and sweet.

The waves still sing the same old song
That knew an elder time;
The breakers' beat is not more strong,
Their music more sublime;
And poets thro' the ages long
Have set these notes to rhyme.

But this shall not deter my lyre,
Nor check my simple strain;
If I have not the old-time fire,
I know the ancient pain:
The hurt of unfulfilled desire,...

Paul Laurence Dunbar