The Sound Of The Sea

The sea awoke at midnight from its sleep,

    And round the pebbly beaches far and wide

    I heard the first wave of the rising tide

    Rush onward with uninterrupted sweep;

A voice out of the silence of the deep,

    A sound mysteriously multiplied

    As of a cataract from the mountain's side,

    Or roar of winds upon a wooded steep.

So comes to us at times, from the unknown

    And inaccessible solitudes of being,

    The rushing of the sea-tides of the soul;

And inspirations, that we deem our own,

    Are some divine foreshadowing and foreseeing

    Of things beyond our reason or control.