Leaping clear of the shallows,
Chancing the creaming bars,
We heard the first faint cheering
As the late sun limned our spars.
Safe in the lee of the city
We moored in the afterglow,
The _Sea Nymph_ and the _Henry_
With the buccaneers in tow.
Glad we had been in the going,
But God! it was good to come
Out of the sky-wide loneliness
To the walls and lights of home.
V
Under these shouldering rows of stone
That notch the quiet sky;
Under the asphalt's transient seal
The same old mud-flats lie;
And I have felt them surge and lift
At night as I passed by.
Yes, I have seen them sprawling nude
While an Autumn moon hung chill,
And the tide came shuddering in from sea,
Lift by lift, until
It held them under a silver mesh,
Responsive to its will.
Then slowly out from the crowding walls
I have seen the gibbets grow,
And stand against the empty sky
In a desolate, windblown row,
While their dancers swayed, and turned, and spun,
Tripping it heel and toe;
With a flash of gold where the peering moon
Saw an earring as it swung,
And a silver line that leapt and died
Where the salt-white sea-boots hung,
And the pitiful, nodding, silent heads,
With half of their songs unsung.
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