Bixby's Landing

They burned lime on the hill and dropped it down

    here in an iron car

On a long cable; here the ships warped in

And took their loads from the engine, the water

    is deep to the cliff. The car

Hangs half way over in the gape of the gorge,

Stationed like a north star above the peaks of

    the redwoods, iron perch

For the little red hawks when they cease from

    hovering

When they've struck prey; the spider's fling of a

    cable rust-glued to the pulleys.

The laborers are gone, but what a good multitude

Is here in return: the rich-lichened rock, the

    rose-tipped stone-crop, the constant

Ocean's voices, the cloud-lighted space.

The kilns are cold on the hill but here in the

    rust of the broken boiler

Quick lizards lighten, and a rattle-snake flows

Down the cracked masonry, over the crumbled

    fire-brick. In the rotting timbers

And roofless platforms all the free companies

Of windy grasses have root and make seed; wild

    buckwheat blooms in the fat

Weather-slacked lime from the bursted barrels.

Two duckhawks darting in the sky of their cliff-hung

    nest are the voice of the headland.

Wine-hearted solitude, our mother the wilderness,

Men's failures are often as beautiful as men's

    triumphs, but your returnings

Are even more precious than your first presence.