Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, SHAKESPEARE'S CLIFF, by ANN RADCLIFFE


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

SHAKESPEARE'S CLIFF, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Here, all along the high sea-cliff
Last Line: "the tempest ""rose, at his command!"
Alternate Author Name(s): Ward, Ann
Subject(s): Climbing; Dramatists; Nature; Plays & Playwrights; Poetry & Poets; Sea; Shakespeare, William (1564-1616); Ocean


Here, all along the high sea-cliff,
Oh, how sweet it is to go!
When Summer lures the light-winged skiff
Over the calm expanse below,—

And tints, with shades of sleepy blue,
Misty ocean's curving shores;
And with a bright and gleaming hue,
Dover's high embattled towers.

How sweet to watch the blue haze steal
Over the whiteness of yon sail;
O'er yon fair cliffs, and now conceal
Boulogne's walls and turrets pale!

Oh! go not near that dizzy brink,
Where the mossed hawthorn hangs its root,
To look how low the sharp crags sink,
Before the tide they overshoot.

Nor listen for their hollow sound—
Thou canst not hear the surges mourn,
Nor see how high the billows bound
Among the caves their rage has worn.

Yet, yet forbear! thou canst not spring,
Like fay, from off this summit high,
And perch upon the out-stretched wing
Of the sea-mew passing by,

And safely with her skirt the clouds;
Or, sweeping downward to the tide,
Frolic amid the seaman's shrouds,
Or on a bounding billow ride.

Ah! no; all this I cannot do;
Yet I will dare the mountain's height,
Seas and shores and skies to view,
And cease but with the dim day-light.

For fearful-sweet it is to stand
On some tall point 'tween earth and heaven,
And view, far round, the two worlds blend,
And the vast deep by wild winds riven.

And fearful-sweet it is to peep
Upon the yellow strands below,
When on their oars the fishers sleep,
And calmer seas their limits know.

And bending o'er this jutting ridge,
To look adown the steep rock's sides,
From crag to crag, from ledge to ledge,
Down which the samphire-gatherer glides.

Perhaps the blue-bell nods its head,
Or poppy trembles o'er the brink,
Or there the wild-briar roses shed
Their tender leaves of fading pink.

Oh fearful-sweet it is, through air
To watch their scattered leaves descend,
Or mark some pensile sea-weed dare
Over the perilous top to bend,

And, joyous in its liberty,
Wave all its playful tresses wide,
Mocking the death, that waits for me,
If I but step one foot aside.

Yet I can hear the solemn surge
Sounding long murmurs on the coast;
And the hoarse waves each other urge,
And voices mingling now, then lost.

The children of the cliffs I hear,
Free as the waves, as daring too;
They climb the rocky ledges there,
To pluck sea-flowers of humble hue.

Their calling voices seem to chime;
Their choral laughs rise far beneath;
While, who the dizziest point can climb,
Throws gaily down the gathered wreath.

I see their little upward hands,
Outspread to catch the falling flowers,
While, watching these, the little bands
Sing welcomes to the painted showers.

And others scramble up the rocks,
To share the pride of him, who, throned
On jutting crag, at danger mocks,
King of the cliffs and regions round.

Clinging with hands and feet and knee,
How few that envied height attain!
Not half-way up those urchins, see,
Yet ply their perilous toil in vain.

Fearless their hero sports in air,
A rival almost of the crows,
And weaves fresh-gathered blossoms there,
To bind upon his victor-brows.

The broad sea-myrtle glossy bright,
Mixed with the poppy's scarlet bell,
And wall-flowers, dipt in golden light,
Twine in his sea-cliff coronal.

The breeze has stolen his pageant-crown;
He leans to mark how low it falls;
Oh, bend not thou! lest, headlong down,
Thou paint'st with death these fair sea-walls!

Now, o'er the sky's concave I glance,
Now o'er the azure deep below,
Now on the long-drawn shores of France,
And now on England's coast I go,

To where old Beachy's beaked head,
High peering in the utmost West,
Bids the observant seaman dread,
Lest he approach his guarded rest.

What fairy hand hangs loose that sail
In graceful fold of sunny light?
Beneath what tiny figures move,
Traced darkly on the wave's blue light?

It is the patient fisher's sloop,
Watching upon the azure calm;
They are his wet sea-boys, that stoop,
And haul the net with bending arm.

But on this southern coast is seen,
From Purbeck hills to Dover piers,
No foam-tipt wave so clearly green,
No rock so dark as Hastings rears.

How grand is that indented bay,
That sweeps to Romney's sea-beat wall,
Whose marshes slowly stretch away,
And slope into some green hill small.

Now North and East I bend my sight
To where the flats of Flanders spread;
And now where Calais cliffs are bright,
Made brighter by the sunset red.

Shows not this towering point so high
To him, who in mid-channel sails;
For the slant light from western sky
Ne'er on its awful front prevails.

But mark! on this cliff Shakspeare stood,
And waved around him Prosper's wand,
When straight from forth the mighty flood
The Tempest "rose, at his command!"





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