Being now no more a singer, but a song.

[Pg 310]

Till one clear day when brighter sea-wind blew

And louder sea-shine lightened, for the waves

Were full of godhead and the light that saves,

His father's, and their spirit had pierced him through,

He felt strange breath and light all round him shed

That bowed him down with rapture; and he knew

His father's hand, hallowing his humbled head,

And the old great voice of the old good time, that said:

"Child of my sunlight and the sea, from birth

A fosterling and fugitive on earth;

Sleepless of soul as wind or wave or fire,

A manchild with an ungrown God's desire;

Because thou hast loved nought mortal more than me,

Thy father, and thy mother-hearted sea;

Because thou hast set thine heart to sing, and sold

Life and life's love for song, God's living gold;

Because thou hast given thy flower and fire of youth

To feed men's hearts with visions, truer than truth;

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