The sea is calm tonight.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits-- on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window, sweet is the night air!
Only from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched land,
Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin, and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.
Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the Aegean, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery; we
Find also in the sound a thought,
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.
The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round the earth's shore
Lay like folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.
Ah, love let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.
T.S. Eliot
Walking in the middle of a storm
It changes and moves.
WE CAN’T KNOW THE CHANGE!
But "The Change" comes suddenly.
And the warmth of the sun changes our mood.
We slide into a world of clouds.
We live / we die.
We live within a life of love.
Walking in the middle of a storm
It changed and moved.
I COULDN’T KNOW THE CHANGE!
But the change came suddenly.
And the warmth of the sun changed my mood.
I slid into the world of clouds.
I lived / I died.
I live within a life of love.
Walking in the middle of a storm
It will change and move.
YOU CAN’T KNOW THE CHANGE!
But "The Change" will come suddenly
And the warmth of the sun will change your mood.
You’ll slide into a world of clouds.
If you live for it / die for it.
You’ll live within a life of love.
By Meandria Tart
Love, unconquerable
Waster of rich men, keeper
Of warm nights and all-night vigil
In the soft face of a girl:
Sea-wanderer, forest-visitor!
Even the pure Immortals cannot escape you,
And mortal man, in his one day's dusk,
Trembles before your glory.
Surely you swerve upon ruin
The just man's consenting heart,
As here you have made bright anger
Strike between father and son---
And none has conquered but Love!
A girl's glance working the will of heaven:
Pleasure to her alone who mocks us,
Merciless Aphrodite.
Translated by Dudley Fitts and Robe
Sappho
click below to go back to
