Page:The Collected Poems of Dora Sigerson Shorter.djvu/211

Seal, in the cliff's shadow, why are thine eyes so mournful?
Come from the gloom and the echo of the sea's sighs in the cave,
Sink down into deeper waters 'mid the hidden flowers of the ocean,
Or seek the splash and sparkle 'neath the snowy break of the wave.
“Man, man has bereft me, robbed me of those my loved ones;
Alone, I find no gladness; alone, where is joy for me
In the silvery flash of the fish or the wonderful gardens of coral?
My eyes grow dim with watching the desolate waste of the sea!”

Woman, king of the world is the babe you hush with sobbing,
King of all that is living in air or sea, or on land.
Therefore why do you kiss with lips that are dumb with sorrow?
Your tear-drops falling cold have chilled the little hand.
This is the soul's proud right, the earth given into his keeping;
And all that lives thereon must come to his feet a slave.
Mother, why do you flee with haggard eyes in the morning.
To answer with white face hid in the grass of a baby's grave?