Sailors there are of the gentlest breed, <br />Yet strong, like every goodly thing; <br />The discipline of arms refines, <br />And the wave gives tempering. <br />The damasked blade its beam can fling; <br />It lends the last grave grace: <br />The hawk, the hound, and sworded nobleman <br />In Titian's picture for a king, <br />Are of hunter or warrior race. <br /> <br />In social halls a favored guest <br />In years that follow victory won, <br />How sweet to feel your festal fame <br />In woman's glance instinctive thrown: <br />Repose is yours--your deed is known, <br />It musks the amber wine; <br />It lives, and sheds a light from storied days <br />Rich as October sunsets brown, <br />Which make the barren place to shine. <br /> <br />But seldom the laurel wreath is seen <br />Unmixed with pensive pansies dark; <br />There's a light and a shadow on every man <br />Who at last attains his lifted mark-- <br />Nursing through night the ethereal spark. <br />Elate he never can be; <br />He feels that spirit which glad had hailed his <br />worth, <br />Sleep in oblivion.--The shark <br />Glides white through the phosphorus sea.<br /><br />Herman Melville<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/commemorative-of-a-naval-victory/
