Lucy Maud Montgomery

The Sea Spirit

I smile o’er the wrinkled blue­
Lo! the sea is fair,
Smooth as the flow of a maiden’s hair;
And the welkin’s light shines through
Into mid-sea caverns of beryl hue,
And the little waves laugh and the mermaids sing,
And the sea is a beautiful, sinuous thing! 

I scowl in sullen guise­
The sea grows dark and dun,
The swift clouds hide the sun
But not the bale-light in my eyes,
And the frightened wind as it flies
Ruffles the billows with stormy wing,
And the sea is a terrible, treacherous thing! 

When moonlight glimmers dim 
I pass in the path of the mist, 
Like a pale spirit by spirits kissed. 
At dawn I chant my own weird hymn, 
And I dabble my hair in the sunset’s rim, 
And I call to the dwellers along the shore 
With a voice of gramarye evermore. 

And if one for love of me 
Gives to my call an ear, 
I will woo him and hold him dear, 
And teach him the way of the sea, 
And my glamor shall ever over him be; 
Though he wander afar in the cities of men 
He will come at last to my arms again.