CASTLE ISLAND LIGHT
(Three thousand miles the wave must roll
Ere it wash the Afric shore).
Here are the coral reefs
That hold their booty fast;
The sea-fan blooms in groves beneath,
And sharks go lolling past.
Hither and yon the sand-bars lie
Where the prickly bush has grown,
And where the rude sponge-fisher dwells
In his wattled hut, alone.
Southward, amid the strait,
Is the Castle Island Light;
Of all that bound the ocean round
It has the loneliest site.
II
'Twixt earth and heaven the waves are driven
Sorely upon its flank;
The light streams out for sea-leagues seven
To the Great Bahama Bank.
A girded tower, a furlong scant
Of whitened sand and rock,
And one sole being the waters seeing,
Where the gull and gannet flock.
He is the warder of the pass
That mariners must find;
His beard drifts down like the ashen moss
Which hangs in the southern wind.
The old man hoar stands on the shore
And bodes the withering gale,
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