I <br />Though the Clerk of the Weather insist, <br />And lay down the weather-law, <br />Pintado and gannet they wist <br />That the winds blow whither they list <br />In tempest or flaw. <br /> <br />II <br />Old are the creeds, but stale the schools, <br />Revamped as the mode may veer, <br />But Orm from the schools to the beaches <br />strays <br />And, finding a Conch hoar with time, he <br />delays <br />And reverent lifts it to ear. <br />That Voice, pitched in far monotone, <br />Shall it swerve? shall it deviate ever? <br />The Seas have inspired it, and Truth-- <br />Truth, varying from sameness never. <br /> <br />III <br />In hollows of the liquid hills <br />Where the long Blue Ridges run, <br />The flattery of no echo thrills, <br />For echo the seas have none; <br />Nor aught that gives man back man's strain-- <br />The hope of his heart, the dream in his brain. <br /> <br />IV <br />On ocean where the embattled fleets repair, <br />Man, suffering inflictor, sails on sufferance <br />there. <br /> <br />V <br />Implacable I, the old Implacable Sea: <br />Implacable most when most I smile serene-- <br />Pleased, not appeased, by myriad wrecks in <br />me. <br /> <br />VI <br />Curled in the comb of yon billow Andean, <br />Is it the Dragon's heaven-challenging crest? <br />Elemental mad ramping of ravening waters-- <br />Yet Christ on the Mount, and the dove in <br />her nest! <br /> <br />VII <br />Healed of my hurt, I laud the inhuman Sea-- <br />Yea, bless the Angels Four that there convene; <br />For healed I am ever by their pitiless breath <br />Distilled in wholesome dew named rosmarine.<br /><br />Herman Melville<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/pebbles-3/
