Foliage of Ocean



III

  Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams
  The blue Mediterranean, where he lay,
  Lull'd by the coil of his crystalline streams,

  Beside a pumice isle in Baiae's bay,
  And saw in sleep old palaces and towers
  Quivering within the wave's intenser day,

  All overgrown with azure moss and flowers
  So sweet, the sense faints picturing them! Thou
  For whose path the Atlantic's level powers

  Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below
  The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear
  The sapless foliage of the ocean, know

  Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear,
  And tremble and despoil themselves: oh hear!







images © 1997 by Randy Wang
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