The Sea of Death: A Fragment

----Methought I sawLife swiftly treading over endless space;And, at her foot-print, but a bygone pace,The ocean-past, which, with increasing wave,Swallow'd her steps like a pursuing grave.

Sad were my thoughts that anchor'd silentlyOn the dead waters of that passionless sea,Unstirr'd by any touch of living breath:Silence hung over it, and drowsy Death,Like a gorged sea-bird, slept with folded wingsOn crowded carcases--sad passive thingsThat wore the thin gray surface, like a veilOver the calmness of their features pale.

And there were spring-faced cherubs that did sleepLike water-lilies on that motionless deep,How beautiful! with bright unruffled hairOn sleek unfretted brows, and eyes that wereBuried in marble tombs, a pale eclipse!And smile-bedimpled cheeks, and pleasant lips,Meekly apart, as if the soul intenseSpake out in dreams of its own innocence:And so they lay in loveliness, and keptThe birth-night of their peace, that Life e'en weptWith very envy of their happy fronts;For there were neighbor brows scarr'd by the bruntsOf strife and sorrowing--where Care had setHis crooked autograph, and marr'd the jetOf glassy locks, with hollow eyes forlorn,And lips that curl'd in bitterness and scorn--Wretched,--as they had breathed of this world's pain,And so bequeathed it to the world again,Through the beholder's heart in heavy sighs.

So lay they garmented in torpid light,Under the pall of a transparent night,Like solemn apparitions lull'd sublimeTo everlasting rest,--and with them TimeSlept, as he sleeps upon the silent faceOf a dark dial in a sunless place.