Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Songs from the Turret. 13. As the waves of the outgoing sea

As the waves of the outgoing sea
   Leave the rocks and the drift wood bare,
When your thoughts are for others than me,
   My heart is the strand of despair--
                      Beloved,
   Where bleak suns glare,
And Joy, like a desolate mourner, gropes
In the wrecks of broken hopes.

As the incoming waves of the sea,
   The rocks and the sandbar hide,
When your thoughts flow back to me,
   My heart leaps up on the tide--
                      Beloved,
   Where my glad hopes ride
With joy at the wheel, and the sun above
In a glorious sky of love.