HOMECOMING

When I came home from wanderings

In a tall chattering ship,

I thought a hundred happy things,

Of people, places, and such things

As I came sailing home.

The tall ship moved how slowly on

With me and hundreds more,

That thought not then of wanderings,

But of unwhispered, longed-for things,

Familiar things of home.

For not in miles seemed other lands

Far off, but in long years

As we came near to England then;

Even the tall ship heard secret things

As she moved trembling home.

It was at dawn. The chattering ship

Was strangely hushed; faint mist

Crept everywhere, and we crept on,

And every eye was creeping on

The mist, as we moved home....

Until we saw, far, very far,

Or dreamed we saw, her cliffs,

And thought of sweet, intolerable things,

Of England — dark, unwhispered things,

Such things, as we crept home.