Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, SEA HARVEST, by WILSON PUGSLEY MACDONALD



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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

SEA HARVEST, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: The sea has furrows
Last Line: Strange are mortal souls forevermore.
Subject(s): Sea; Ocean


THE sea has furrows
But no ploughman's tracks.
What will be sown there?
Stout fishing-smacks,
Sailors with hazel eyes
And hair like flax,
Men who loved too well the sea's lore.

What will they reap there
From this strange seed?
Tears salter than the frost
On the seaweed,
Widows of the water's toll,
Of the storm's greed --
Old widows who will love no more.

When the sea is turned
Like cold, ploughed loam
There's weeping and wailing
In every sailor's home.
What will the drag-net
Bring in its comb?
Sad are the vigils on the shore.

Call the sailor's wives
Back from the farms
Where tired women sleep
In strong men's arms,
And they'll go weeping
For the sea's alarms
And nights of waiting on the shore.

Those who love to spin
Will keep to their spinning,
Saints to their prayers,
Sinners to their sinning,
Every one to the track
Where they made beginning:
Strange are mortal souls forevermore.





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