The Return to the Sea

LET us destroy the dream! She knows not of it.
Let us go back rejoicing to the sea.
Sighing is vain, and laughter shall not profit;
But fill Life’s frothing cup again and quaff it
To wider hopes and greater things to be.

Time turns his tide, and turns back our distresses;
Let us return unshaken as we came.
Shall we, the wanderers, mourn for lost caresses?
Our hands are fettered by no cloudy tresses;
Ours are the hearts no starry eyes can tame.

Yet, had she heard the tones our songs could lend her,
We might have found some world of hers and mine
Sweet with perfume of summer roses tender,
And vibrant with the salt sea’s strength and splendor,
And lit by stars that now shall never shine.

Nay, but she would not — nay, she could not know them,
The flying dreams with vast and vivid wings.
Days and delights with poisoned pain below them,
Hopes, flowers, and fancies, — where shall we bestow them ?
What shall we do with all these wasted things ?

Sink them in seas that give their dead up never;
A hundred fathoms deep beneath the main;
Beside the rotted wrecks of old endeavor,
So that no daring deep-sea diver ever
Can bring our worthless treasures up again.

For her the safer life of dreams crushed under.
The petty pleasures, and the dusty way.
For us the oceanic throb and thunder,
The resonance of all the winds of wonder
And lordly interchange of night and day.

Nay, she has chosen. Let us turn our faces,
And go back gladly to the windy shore;
And follow far the tide’s tumultuous traces
Toward the fierce flicker of adventurous places,
And look not back, nor listen any more.