Page:Poems Rossetti.djvu/282

SLEEP AT SEA.

SOUND the deep waters:—
 Who shall sound that deep?—
Too short the plummet,
 And the watchmen sleep.
Some dream of effort
 Up a toilsome steep;
Some dream of pasture grounds
 For harmless sheep.

White shapes flit to and fro
 From mast to mast;
They feel the distant tempest
 That nears them fast:
Great rocks are straight ahead,
 Great shoals not past;
They shout to one another
 Upon the blast.

Oh, soft the streams drop music
 Between the hills,
And musical the birds' nests
 Beside those rills
The nests are types of home
 Love-hidden from ills,
The nests are types of spirits
 Love-music fills.