This page has been validated.
THE TWO SHIPS
(To G.H.C.S.)
I dream’d I stood on some advanced cliff
Heading the harbourage of Heaven, and watch’d,
From out the open deep, their voyage done,
Ships making port; and these I knew for souls,
Coming from earthly travel home to God,
But in the very guise of ships they came;
Diverse in build, of varying speed, and size
Unequal; and among them, as I look’d,
Chiefly conspicuous, two.
The first swam in,
Beauty incarnate! From the distant blue
Stately emerging, gliding gradual on,
Her visionary towers of swelling snow,
Aerial, azure-spaced, offended not
That crystal atmosphere, shamed not one beam
67
