WHERE shall we sail to-day?'--Thus said, methought, <br />A voice that only could be heard in dreams: <br />And on we glided without mast or oar, <br />A wondrous boat upon a wondrous sea. <br /> <br />Sudden, the shore curved inward to a bay, <br />Broad, calm, with gorgeous sea-weeds waving slow <br />Beneath the water, like rich thoughts that stir <br />In the mysterious deep of poets' hearts. <br /> <br />So still, so fair, so rosy in the dawn <br />Lay that bright bay: yet something seemed to breath, <br />Or in the air, or from the whispering waves, <br />Or from that voice, as near as one's own soul, <br /> <br />'There was a wreck last night.' A wreck? then where <br />The ship, the crew?--The all-entombing sea <br />On which is writ nor name nor chronicle <br />Laid itself o'er them with smooth crystal smile. <br /> <br />'Yet was the wreck last night.'. And gazing down <br />Deep down below the surface, we were ware <br />Of ghastly faces with their open eyes <br />Uplooking to the dawn they could not see. <br /> <br />One moved with moving sea-weeds: one lay prone, <br />The tinted fishes gliding o'er his breast; <br />One, caught by floating hair, rocked quietly <br />Upon his reedy cradle, like a child. <br /> <br />'The wreck has been'--said the melodious voice, <br />'Yet all is peace. The dead, that, while we slept, <br />Struggled for life, now sleep and fear no storms: <br />O'er them let us not weep when heaven smiles.' <br /> <br />So we sailed on above the diamond sands, <br />Bright sea-flowers, and white faces stony calm, <br />Till the waves bore us to the open main, <br />And the great sun arose upon the world.<br /><br />Dinah Maria Mulock Craik<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-dream-of-death-2/
