[BNP/E3, 79 – 13-14]

I.

A mystic seaman, not of any nation

Told me a story, terrible and true

Killing with nothingness and expectation, {…}

Of how departing from {…}

Through which the shore his {…}

{…} did not tell

Such things did pass as words cannot construe

And what {…} and what to him befell.

_______

II.

The ocean smiled unto the sun that gave

The power to smile[1] and with rhythmic motion

Rhythmically tossed the bark upon the wave

And tossed the wave upon the {…}[2]

And all was thrilled by the obscure commotion

Of beauty’s peace, aught that would not be seen

Yet he devined, {…} the soul’s devotion,

And aught {…} so serene

Putting the mind in dreams of things which never hath been.

[13^v]

And like the lightnings cold unto the eyne

{…} we approach

A waste, tremendous and fantastic shore

On whose dim place the lightless waves (?) encroach

(Seeming in {…} door)

Vexing the soul with their maided roar

Joined from the land a clamour to the deep

And round that {…} perpetual was did keep.

A moan, a prayer from a nothingness to address

As when we among life do risk to sleep

Among {…} their restless watch do keep.

_______

[14^r]

Around the {…} ship their {…} wove.

III.

There is a Presence of most powerless Beauty

That haunts herein the {…} the air

Riddling with pain the nothingness of duty

And the weak fairness of things that are fair

Filling the insatiate spirit everywhere

With sights and sounds of wondrous

To know what these beyond themselves contain.

IV.

We are creatures of our {…} thought

By craving shallow that we ourselves feed

All the dim castle of our life wrought

We lust and ache and love {…} and our every deed

Is fought with nothingness. We starve and bleed

To {…}

{…} we saw the seed

Of useless things that our own eyes behold

Scarce grow by the {…} mind unloved and terror and {…}

[14^v]

As if darkness did compel

A light its own

And our ignoring souls divined on {…} presence terrible

{…} as if there were

There was a nameless horror in the air

As if we had transposed, sans sense and mild

Living’s portals undefined.

______

A sense of horror, a dread expectation

Circumscribed with itself

‘Twas if the storm’s {…} pause

Had separate life {…}

[1] The power to smile ^{/The smile’s its soul\}

[2] tossed the wave upon the {…} ^{/moved like music on the strangled ocean\}