May / Edwin Arnold

from The Twelve Months

May

Who cares on the land to stay,
Wasting the wealth of a day?
    The fallow fields leave
    For the meadows that heave,
And away to the sea — away!

To the meadows far out on the deep,
Whose ploughs are the winds that sweep
    The green furrows high,
    When into the sky
The silvery foam-bells leap.

At sea! — my bark — at sea!
With the winds, and the wild clouds and me;
    The low shore soon
    Will be down with the moon.
And none on the waves but we!

Thy wings are abroad, my bird!
And the sound of their speed is heard;
    The scud flieth west,
    And the gull to her nest,
But they lag far behind us, my bird!

White as my true love's neck
Are the sails that shadow thy deck;
    And thine image wan,
    Like the stream-mirrored swan,
Lies dim on thy dancing track.

On! on! with a swoop and a swirl,
High over the clear waves' curl;
    Under thy prow.
    Like a fairy, now.
Make the blue water bubble with pearl.

Lo! yonder, my lady, the light!
'Tis the last of the land in sight!
    Look once — and away!
    Bows down in tbe spray;
Lighted on by the lamps of the night!

~~

Edwin Arnold (1832-1904), 1884

from Poems: National and non-oriental, 1906

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

Johannes Christiaan Schotel (1787-1838), "Frigate", Public domain, Wikimedia Commons.

[June]

Edwin Arnold biography

Sea-Fever / John Masefield

Sea-Fever

I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by;
And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea’s face, and a grey dawn breaking.

I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must go down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull’s way and the whale’s way where the wind’s like a whetted 

    knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.

~~
John Masefield (1878-1967)
from Salt-Water Ballads, 1902

[Poem is in the public domain in Canada and the United States]

John Masefield biography

About "Sea-Fever"

"Sea-Fever" read by Ian Batchelor. Courtesy LiveCanonPoetry.

August / H. Cordelia Ray

from The Procession of the Seasons

August

    Haste to the mighty ocean,
    List to the lapsing waves;
With what a strange commotion
    They seek their coral caves.
From heat and turmoil let us oft return,
The ocean's solemn majesty to learn.

~~
H. Cordelia Ray (1852-1916)
from Poems, 1910

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

[September]

H. Cordelia Ray biography

DiscoA340, Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina, August 2022 (detail).

CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons.

Change / Raymond Knister

Change

I shall not wonder more, then,
But I shall know.

Leaves change, and birds, flowers,
And after years are still the same.

The sea's breast heaves in sighs to the moon,
But they are moon and sea forever.

As in other times the trees stand tense and lonely,
And spread a hollow moan of other times.

You will be you yourself,
I'll find you more, not else,
For vintage of the woeful years.

The sea breathes, or broods, or loudens,
Is bright or is mist and the end of the world;
And the sea is constant to change.

I shall not wonder more, then,
But I shall know.

~~
Raymond Knister (1899-1932)
from The Midland, December 1922

[Poem is in the public domain in Canada, the United States, and the European Union]

Raymond Knister biography

"Change", courtesy ichthyschiro.

A June Night / Emma Lazarus

A June Night

Ten o’clock: the broken moon
     Hangs not yet a half hour high,
          Yellow as a shield of brass,
In the dewy air of June,
     Poised between the vaulted sky
          And the ocean’s liquid glass.

Earth lies in the shadow still;
     Low black bushes, trees and lawn
          Night’s ambrosial dews absorb;
Through the foliage creeps a thrill,
     Whispering of yon spectral dawn
          And the hidden climbing orb.

Higher, higher, gathering light,
     Veiling with a golden gauze
          All the trembling atmosphere,
See, the rayless disk grows white!
     Hark, the glittering billows pause!
          Faint, far sounds possess the ear.

Elves on such a night as this
     Spin their rings upon the grass;
          On the beech the water-fay
Greets her lover with a kiss;
     Through the air swift spirits pass,
          Laugh, caress, and float away.

Shut thy lids and thou shalt see
     Angel faces wreathed with light,
          Mystic forms long vanished hence.
Ah, too fine, too rare, they be
     For the grosser mortal sight,
          And they foil our waking sense.

Yet we feel them floating near,
     Know that we are not alone,
          Though our open eyes behold
Nothing save the moon’s bright sphere,
     In the vacant heavens shown,
          And the ocean’s path of gold.

~~
Emma Lazarus (1849-1887)
from Poems, 1888

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

Emma Lazarus biography

"A June Night" read by Ghizela Rowe. Courtesy Ghizela Rowe – Topic.

June Night / Sara Teasdale

June Night

Oh Earth, you are too dear to-night,
How can I sleep while all around
Floats rainy fragrance and the far
Deep voice of the ocean that talks to the ground?

Oh Earth, you gave me all I have,
I love you, I love you,— oh what have I
That I can give you in return —
Except my body after I die?

~~
Sara Teasdale (1884-1933)
from Flame and Shadow, 1920

[Poem is in the public domain in Canada, the United States, and the European Union]

Sara Teasdale biography

"June Night" read by Ghizela rowe. Courtesy Ghizela Rowe - Topic.

On the Beach in November / Edward Cracroft Lefroy

On the Beach in November

My heart's Ideal, that somewhere out of sight
Art beautiful and gracious and alone,–
Haply, where blue Saronic waves are blown
On shores that keep some touch of old delight,–
How welcome thy memory, and how bright,
To one who watches over leagues of stone
These chilly northern waters creep and moan
From weary morning unto weary night.
O Shade-form, lovelier than the living crowd,
So kind to votaries, yet thyself unvowed,
So free to human fancies, fancy-free,
My vagrant thought goes out to thee, to thee,
As wandering lonelier than the Poet's cloud,
I listen to the wash of this dull sea.

~~
Edward Cracroft Lefroy (1855-1891)
from Sonnets of this Century, 1887

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

Edward Cracroft Lefroy biography

"On the Beach in November" courtesy Heidi's Here and There.

By the Autumn Sea / Paul Hamilton Hayne

By the Autumn Sea

Fair as the dawn of the fairest day,
Sad as the evening's tender gray,
By the latest lustre of sunset kissed,
That wavers and wanes through an amber mist,
There cometh a dream of the past to me,
On the desert sands, by the autumn sea.

All heaven is wrapped in a mystic veil,
And the face of the ocean is dim and pale,
And there rises a wind front the chill northwest,
That seemeth the wail of a soul's unrest,
As the twilight falls, and the vapors flee
Far over the wastes of the autumn sea.

A single ship through the gloaming glides
Upborne on the swell of the seaward tides;
And above the gleam of her topmost spar
Are the virgin eyes of the vesper-star
That shine with an angel's ruth on me,
A hopeless waif, by the autumn sea.

The wings of the ghostly beach-birds gleam
Through the shimmering surf, and the curlew's scream
Falls faintly shrill from the darkening height;
The first weird sigh on the lips of Night
Breathes low through the sedge and the blasted tree,
With a murmur of doom, by the autumn sea.

Oh, sky-enshadowed and yearning main,
Your gloom but deepens this human pain;
Those waves seem big with a nameless care,
That sky is a type of the heart's despair,
As I linger and muse by the sombre lea,
And the night shades close on the autumn sea.
~~
Paul Hamilton Hayne (1830-1886)
from Poems, 1882

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

Paul Hamilton Hayne biography

At the Seaside / Robert Louis Stevenson

At the Seaside

When I was down beside the sea
A wooden spade they gave to me
      To dig the sandy shore.

My holes were empty like a cup.
In every hole the sea came up,
      Till it could come no more.

~~
Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894)
from A Child's Garden of Verses, 1885

[Poem is in the public domain]

Robert Louis Stevenson biography

Evening on Calais Beach / William Wordsworth

from Miscellaneous Sonnets

XXXIII

It is a beauteous evening, calm and free,
The holy time is quiet as a Nun
Breathless with adoration; the broad sun
Is sinking down in its tranquillity;
The gentleness of heaven broods o'er the sea:
Listen! the mighty Being is awake,
And doth with his eternal motion make
A sound like thunder — everlastingly.
Dear Child! dear Girl! that walkest with me here,
If thou appear untouch'd by solemn thought,
Thy nature is not therefore less divine:
Thou liest in Abraham's bosom all the year;
And worshipp'st at the Temple's inner shrine,
God being with thee when we know it not.

~~
William Wordsworth (1770-1850)
from Poems in Two Volumes, 1807

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

William Wordsworth biography

"It is a beauteous evening ..." courtesy John Reads Poetry.

Stanzas for Music / George Gordon, Lord Byron

Stanzas for Music

There be none of Beauty's daughters
With a magic like thee;
And like music on the waters
Is thy sweet voice to me:
When, as if its sound were causing
The charmed ocean's pausing,
The waves lie still and gleaming,
And the lull'd winds seem dreaming:

And the midnight moon is weaving
Her bright chain o'er the deep;
Whose breast is gently heaving,
As an infant's asleep:
So the spirit bows before thee,
To listen and adore thee;
With a full but soft emotion,
Like the swell of Summer's ocean.

~~
George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824)
from Poems, 1816

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

Lord Byron biography

"Stanzas for Music" read by Veronica Suarez. Courtesy PoetrySpoken.com.

I started Early / Emily Dickinson

[656]

I started Early – Took my Dog –
And visited the Sea –
The Mermaids in the Basement
Came out to look at me –

And Frigates – in the Upper Floor
Extended Hempen Hands –
Presuming Me to be a Mouse –
Aground – upon the Sands –

But no Man moved Me – till the Tide
Went past my simple Shoe –
And past my Apron – and my Belt
And past my Bodice – too –

And made as He would eat me up –
As wholly as a Dew
Upon a Dandelion's Sleeve –
And then – I started – too –

And He – He followed – close behind –
I felt His Silver Heel
Opon my Ancle – Then My Shoes
Would overflow with Pearl –

Until We met the Solid Town –
No One He seemed to know –
And bowing – with a Mighty look –
At me – The Sea withdrew –

~~

Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

Emily Dickinson biography

"I started Early" read by Blair Brown; animation by Maureen Selwood.

Courtesy PoetryEverywherePTV.

2 poems / Sara Teasdale

"I Thought of You"

I thought of you and how you love this beauty,
   And walking up the long beach all alone;
I heard the waves, breaking in measured thunder
   As you and I once heard their monotone.

Around me were the echoing dunes, beyond me
   The cold and sparkling silver of the sea —
We two will pass through death and ages lengthen
   Before you hear that sound again with me.

"I Thought of You" read for Reader's Utopia.

On the Dunes

If there is any life when death is over,
   These tawny beaches will know much of me,
I shall come back, as constant and as changeful
   As the unchanging, many-colored sea.

If life was small, if it has made me scornful,
   Forgive me; I shall straighten like a flame
In the great calm of death, and if you want me
   Stand on the sea-ward dunes and call my name.

~~
Sara Teasdale (1884-1933)
from Flame and Shadow, 1920

[Poems are in the public domain in Canada, the United States, and the European Union]

Sara Teasdale biography

"On the Dunes" read by Ghizela Rowe. Courtesy Ghizela Rowe - Topic.

Beach Song / Pearl Andelson Sherry

Beach song

from From a Bay-window

What are they weaving under the water?
They make sheer laces and drag them down.
They ruffle a lawn with a great grieving.
What are they making — what manner of gown?

What are they weaving, caught here,    
Caught there, on the thin-washed blue?
Who is to be married or who is to be buried,
Under the water, under the water?

~~
Pearl Andelson Sherry (1899-1966)
from Poetry, December 1921

[Poem is in the public domain in Canada and the United States]

Pearl Andelson Sherry biography

By the Sea / Christina Rossetti

By the Sea

Why does the sea moan evermore?
Shut out from heaven it makes its moan,
It frets against the boundary shore;
All earth's full rivers cannot fill
The sea, that drinking thirsteth still.

Sheer miracles of loveliness
Lie hid in its unlooked-on bed:
Anemones, salt, passionless,
Blow flower-like; just enough alive
To blow and multiply and thrive.

Shells quaint with curve, or spot, or spike,
Encrusted live things argus-eyed,
All fair alike, yet all unlike,
Are born without a pang, and die
Without a pang, and so pass by.

~~
Christina Rossetti (1830-1894)
from Poems, 1890

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

Christina Rossetti biography

"By the Sea" courtesy The Verse Place.

The Wind Sleepers / H.D.

The Wind Sleepers

Whiter
than the crust
left by the tide,
we are stung by the hurled sand
and the broken shells.

We no longer sleep
in the wind —
we awoke and fled
through the city gate.

Tear —
tear us an altar,
tug at the cliff-boulders,
pile them with the rough stones —
we no longer
sleep in the wind,
propitiate us.

Chant in a wail
that never halts,
pace a circle and pay tribute
with a song.

When the roar of a dropped wave
breaks into it,
pour meted words
of sea-hawks and gulls
and sea-birds that cry
discords.

~~
H.D. (1886-1961)
from Sea Garden, 1916

[Poem is in the public domain in Canada and the United States]

"The Wind Sleepers" read by Robyn O'Neil.

(Poem begins at 2:35)

H.D. biography

Break, Break, Break / Alfred Tennyson

Break, Break, Break

Break, break, break,
         On thy cold gray stones, O Sea!
And I would that my tongue could utter
         The thoughts that arise in me.

O, well for the fisherman's boy,
         That he shouts with his sister at play!
O, well for the sailor lad,
         That he sings in his boat on the bay!

And the stately ships go on
         To their haven under the hill;
But O for the touch of a vanish'd hand,
         And the sound of a voice that is still!

Break, break, break
         At the foot of thy crags, O Sea!
But the tender grace of a day that is dead
         Will never come back to me.

~~
Alfred Tennyson (1809-1892), 1835
from Poems, 1842

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

"Break, Break, Break" read by Moses Shobet.

Alfred Tennyson biography

About "Break, Break, Break"

Self-Criticism in February / Robinson Jeffers

Self-Criticism in February

The bay is not blue but sombre yellow
With wrack from the battered valley, it is speckled with violent foam heads
And tiger-striped with long lovely storm-shadows.
You love this better than the other mask; better eyes than yours
Would feel the equal beauty of the blue.
It is certain you have loved the beauty of storm disproportionately.
But the present time is not pastoral, but founded
On violence, pointed for more massive violence: perhaps it is not
Perversity but need that perceives the storm-beauty.
Well, bite on this: your poems are too full of ghosts and demons,
And people like phantoms – how often life's are –
And passion so strained that the clay mouths go praying for destruction –
Alas, it is not unusual in life;
To every soul at some time. But why insist on it? And now
For the worst fault: you have never mistaken
Demon nor passion nor idealism for the real God.
Then what is most disliked in those verses
Remains most true. Unfortunately. If only you could sing
That God is love, or perhaps that social
Justice will prevail. I can tell lies in prose.

~~
Robinson Jeffers (1887-1962)
from Such Counsels You Gave to Me, and other poems, 1937 

[Poem is in the public domain in Canada]

Robinson Jeffers biography

The Ocean / Nathaniel Hawthorne

The Ocean

The Ocean has its silent caves,
Deep, quiet, and alone;
Though there be fury on the waves,
Beneath them there is none.

The awful spirits of the deep
Hold their communion there;
And there are those for whom we weep,
The young, the bright, the fair.

Calmly the wearied seamen rest
Beneath their own blue sea.
The ocean solitudes are blest,
For there is purity.

The earth has guilt, the earth has care,
Unquiet are its graves;
But peaceful sleep is ever there,
Beneath the dark blue waves.

~~
Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864)
from The Mariner's Library; or, Voyager's companion, 1833

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

"The Ocean." Courtesy Genevieve Hoffman.

Nathaniel Hawthorne biography

Sea Gulls / Jeanette Marks

Sea Gulls

On Leaving Eggemoggin

Sea gulls I saw lifting the dawn with rosy feet,
Bearing the sunlight on their wings,
Dripping the dusk from burnished plumes;
And I thought
It would be a joy to be a sea gull
At dusk, at dawn of way,
And through long sunlit hours.

Sea gulls I saw carrying the night on their backs,
Wide tail spread crescent for the moon and stars –
The moon a glowing jelly fish,
The stars foam flecks of light;
And I thought
It would be joy to be a sea gull!

How I would dart with them,
Strike storm with coral spur,
Rip whirling spray of angry tides,
Snatch mangled, light-shot offal of the sea,–
Torn, tossed, and moving terribly;
And stare for stare anser those myriad eyes
That float and sway, stab, sting, and die away!

How I would peer from wide cold eyes of fire –
At dusk, at dawn
And through the long daylight –
Into those coiling depths of sea;
Then split the sun, the moon, the stars,
With laughter, laughter, laughter,
For the sea's mad power!

~~
Jeanette Marks (1874-1964)
from Willow Pollen, 1921

[Poem is in the public domain in Canada and the United States]

Jeanette Marks biography