Sea, Rivers and Oceans

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan A stately pleasure dome decree: Where Alph, the sacred river, ran Through caverns measureless to man Down to a sunless sea. So twice five miles of fertile ground With walls and towers were girdled round.

Round the cape of a sudden came the sea, And the sun looked over the mountain’s rim: And straight was a path of gold for him, And the need of a world of men for me.

Roll on, thou deep and dark blue ocean—roll! Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain; Man marks the earth with ruin—his control Stops with the shore.

It keeps eternal whisperings around Desolate shores, and with its mighty swell Gluts twice ten thousand caverns.

It was the schooner Hesperus, That sailed the wintry sea; And the skipper had taken his little daughter, To bear him company.

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore, There is society, where none intrudes, By the deep sea, and music in its roar: I love not man the less, but Nature more.

The sea is calm tonight. The tide is full, the moon lies fair Upon the straits; on the French coast, the light Gleams, and is gone; the cliffs of England stand, Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.

As idle as a painted ship

Full many a gem of purest ray serene,

It was the schooner Hesperus,

From the great deep to the great deep he goes.

 

And now there came both mist and snow, And it grew wondrous cold: And ice, mast-high, came floating by, As green as emerald.

Her beams bemocked the sultry main, Like April hoarfrost spread; But where the ship’s huge shadow lay, The charmed water burnt alway A still and awful red.

Where great whales come sailing by, Sail and sail, with unshut eye, Round the world forever and aye.

I never saw a Moor— I never saw the Sea— Yet know I how the Heather looks And what a Billow be. I never spoke with God Nor visited in Heaven— Yet certain am I of the spot As if the Checks were given—

I wiped away the weeds and foam, I fetched my sea-born treasures home; But the poor, unsightly, noisome things Had left their beauty on the shore, With the sun and the sand and the wild uproar.

Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar.

Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean—roll!

Water, water, everywhere,

From the lone shieling of the misty island

O fons Bandusiae, splendidior vitro.

In a solitude of the sea

Water is sufficient...the spirit moves over water.

Break, break, break,