Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882). Complete Poetical Works. 1893.
In the HarborElegiac Verse
Walking alone by the sea, hearing the wash of the waves,
Learned the secret from them of the beautiful verse elegiac,
Breathing into his song motion and sound of the sea.
Plunges loud on the sands, pauses, and turns, and retreats,
So the Hexameter, rising and singing, with cadence sonorous,
Falls; and in refluent rhythm back the Pentameter flows.
Bloom into song, as the gorse blossoms in autumn and spring.
Though it be Jacob’s voice, Esau’s, alas! are the hands.
When to leave off is an art only attained by the few.
Hail and snow and rain, are they not three, and yet one?
Ships and the shadows of ships hang in the motionless air;
So by the art of the poet our common life is uplifted,
So, transfigured, the world floats in a luminous haze.
When with the masculine rhymes mingled the feminine are.
Little it dreams of the mill hid in the valley below;
Glad with the joy of existence, the child goes singing and laughing,
Little dreaming what toils lie in the future concealed.
When we begin to write, however sluggish before.
If we seek it elsewhere, old shall we grow in the search.
Every arrow that flies feels the attraction of earth.
While we are speaking the word, it is already the Past.
As between daylight and dark ghost-like the landscape appears.
Many a poem is marred by a superfluous verse.