POETRY.
ON THE WELSH COAST.
BLIND led by many a friendly star, I hurry through a land of sleep; For like a trumpet from afar
I beard the challenge of the deep, And down the cliff's thyme-scented turf I spring upon the midnight sands, And strip beside the whispering surf, And give my body to its hands.
It greets me with a giant glee ; I wrestle in its rough embrace; The stinging kisses of the sea Are like a scourge upon my face.
But we who drink its air divine, And listen to its endless song, We love the buffet of the brine That makes our thrilling nerves so strong.
Then, on a travelling wave adrift, Supine with idle arms I lie, And watch the coastwise mountains lift Their kingly summits to the sky; While in the pauses of the breeze Mysterious voices call and chide, For these are Gwalia's faery seas, And yonder Snowdon's haunted side !
Or where her masthead lantern throws A quivering shaft upon the dark, I pass beneath the dipping bows Of some belated fishing bark; I see by that unstable light The bearded faces of the crew, And from the desert of the night I answer to their hoarse halloo.
Still onward, like a child that sleeps Locked in a genie's arms, I speed ; Beneath me lie the unfathomed deeps, But I no thought of peril heed; While on that mighty bosom borne, And through a world so vast and dim, With labour and delight outworn I almost slumber as I swim.
Till suddenly the stars have fled!
For now the night is at its noon, And o'er a misty ocean spread The silver footprints of the moon; And where that shining pathway gleams Athwart the heaving, shimmering main, A wandering soul whom love redeems, I turn me to the shore again.
EDWARD SYDNEY TYLEE.
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