Seaward

Seaward there is but light and the faint plume

Of distant ship low down.  Gales from the west

Have ceased at last as if there were no more

Good reason to bring home the ships for whom

Wait lands once populous but now unblessed

With habitation or with human lore.

The smoke of that far steamer still doth loom

As a dark blur which slowly fades to rest,

Like the dim memory of the days of yore

Before the busy past had rolled to doom.

In all the wide world, far as eye can see,

From this white strand, as bare it lies to-day,

That remote trace of smoke that dies away

Is the sole sign of man’s activity

 

Weekly Times     21.9.62