OH, silent glory of the summer day!

How, then, we watched with glad and indolent eyes

The white-sailed ships dream on their shining way,

Till, fading, they were mingled with the skies, and have we not watched her, too, on nights that steep  the soul in peace of moonlight, softy move as a passionate maiden, who in sleep Laughs low, and tosses in a dream of love?

And when the heat broke up, and in its place, came the strong, shouting days and nights, that run, all while with stars, across the laboring ways of billows warm and storm, instead of sun, in grey and desolate twilights, when no feet save ours might dare the shore,

Did we not come through winds that all in vain against us beat until we had the warm-smelling foam full in our faces,

And the frantic wind shrieked round us, and our cheeks grew numb, than warm, until we felt our souls, no more confined, mix with waves, and strain against the storm?

Oh! the immense, illimitable delight

It is, to stand by some tempestuous bay,

What time the great sea waxes warm and white

And beats and blinds the following wind with spray!