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What art thou, watcher o'er the deep,
Sitting so motionless and mute;
White round thy head the sea-birds sweep,
And dash the wild waves at thy foot?
Far out on the dark rocky beach,
Where jagged cliffs around thee rise,
And mortal may not hope to reach
Thy form defined against the skies,
I see thee—as a pilgrim clad:
The pilgrim's cap thy features veil,
But fancy paints them stern or sad,
Responsive to the ocean's wail.
The billows cast their foaming spray
Against thy still unbending form,
Yet thou dost ever lonely stay
Amidst the sunshine and the storm.
Methinks that every passing sail,
Swelling in the free ocean breeze,
Bends forward, thy dark form to hail,
As steering out to foreign seas.
The earth, at midnight, spirits throng—
Then—marble tombs give up their dead,
Then—mermaids chant their plaintive song,
And sportive elves their green haunts tread.
Does that weird hour affect thee not?
Has it no power for thy release?
Oh! ever chained to yon wild spot,
When may thy rigid thraldom cease?
Lone watcher through the gloomy night,
Thou—thou art ever still the same;
Is it some necromantic rite
That thy strange fate and form proclaim?
Or is it, thou hast sought in vain
For some expected distant bark,
That, far beneath the raging main,
Hath stink to ocean's caverns dark;
And, like a Niobe's, have flown
Thy silent tears, in hushed despair,
Till thou, too, hast been turned to stone,
And doomed to watch for ever there?
For ever! No—that may not be,
Though bound unto yon rocky shore,
Dark Pilgrim!—Time shall set thee free,
Ere Time itself shall he no more.
- ↑ There ia a rock on the shore at Ilfracombe which bears a strong resemblance to a figure in pilgrim's dress, seated on the edge of a cliff, and looking towards the sea.
