We watched the dawn breaking across the sea
While just above us hung the evening star.
The nearer waters took a hint of white
And clouds and waves together massed afar,
Narrowed our morning world of pallid light
Till dawn seemed very close to you and me.
'Nay, dawn, stay farther off. Be Magdalen.
Go back into the distance whence you came.
The Near is meaningless when Far is nought,'
So I; and you. 'Wait but a little then,
And day, whole day, uprising like a flame,
Will show us the far reaches of our thought.'