William Wetmore Story

At Dieppe

THE SHIVERING column of the moonlight lies
    Upon the crumbling sea;
Down the lone shore the flying curlew cries
    Half humanly.

With hoarse, dull wash the backward dragging surge
    Its rancid pebbles rakes,
Or swelling dark runs down with toppling verge,
    And flashing breaks.

The lighthouse flares and darkens from the cliff,
    And stares with lurid eye
Fiercely along the sea and shore, as if
    Some foe to spy.

What knowing thought, O ever-moaning sea,
    Haunts thy perturbéd breast,—
What dark crime weighs upon thy memory
    And spoils thy rest?

Thy soft swell lifts and swings the new-launched yacht
    With polished spars and deck,
But crawls and grovels where the bare ribs rot
    Of the old wreck.

O treacherous courtier! thy deceitful lie
    To youth is gayly told,
But in remorse I see thee cringingly
    Crouch to the old.