On the Sea

It keeps eternal whisperings around

      Desolate shores, and with its mighty swell

      Gluts twice ten thousand caverns, till the spell

Of Hecate leaves them their old shadowy sound.

Often 't is in such gentle temper found,

      That scarcely will the very smallest shell

      Be mov'd for days from where it sometime fell,

When last the winds of Heaven were unbound.

O ye! who have your eyeballs vex'd and tir'd,

      Feast them upon the wideness of the Sea;

            O ye! whose ears are dinn'd with uproar rude,

      Or fed too much with cloying melody,—

            Sit ye near some old cavern's mouth, and brood

Until ye start, as if the sea-nymphs quired!