Page:Poems Thaxter.djvu/87

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HEARTBREAK HILL.
85
O, but the weary, merciless days,
With the sun above, with the sea afar,—
No change in her fixed and wistful gaze
From the morning-red to the evening star!

O, the winds that blew, and the birds that sang,
The calms that smiled, and the storms that rolled,
The bells from the town beneath, that rang
Through the summer's heat and the winter's cold!

The flash of the plunging surges white,
The soaring gull's wild boding cry,
She was weary of all; there was no delight
In heaven or earth, and she longed to die.

What was it to her though the Dawn should paint
With delicate beauty skies and seas?
But the sweet, sad sunset splendors faint
Made her soul sick with memories:

Drowning in sorrowful purple a sail
In the distant east, where shadows grew,
Till the twilight shrouded it, cold and pale,
And the tide of her anguish rose anew.