SWEET, my Sweet, by the winding-water
Sit and sing as the days go by.
(What if the sounding sea had taught her
Lust of life and the fear to die!)

Here in the circuit thou hast drawn
Consult the mayflower and the dew;
And peace attend thee on the lawn,
Beneath a sky forever blue.

The green be grateful to thine eyes,
The blue a benediction be;
The waters bless thee where they rise;
But look not downward to the sea.

A limpid source of water, silver
Bubbling up through golden sand,
Leads, ah! down to the rolling river,
Down, ah, down! to the sounding strand.

There the waves on the shifting margent,
Night and day with a rhythmic roar,
Beat and batter the black and argent
Reef and rock of the sullen shore.

Spring will rise with a broken wing,
Crippled in leaf and bud and stem;
The winding-water cease to sing,
The dawn will drop her diadem,

When thou but once beyond the pale
Hast learned to look, or dared to see
The sunrise shattered in the gale,
The brazen terror of the sea.

Rather, at rest in what is thine,
Sip thou the honey as it flows,
Nor lift thy wing above the line,
A blind bee in a garden-close.