Poems (Edwards)/The Stormy Winds

by Matilda Caroline Smiley Edwards

THE STORMY WINDS. "GOD HELP THE SAILOR NOW."

The stormy winds, they are out to-night,
 They are sweeping across the hills,
They are dipping their wings in the rolling tide,
 They are dancing along the rills;
They are wrestling now with the forest king,
 And now with the mountain hoar,
They are whistling now, and the rocking pines,
 With their mingled voices roar;
They are rolling down with their giant arms,
 The rocks from the mountain's brow,
They are marching in armies along the deep,
 "God help the sailor now."

They sweep the sea with their icy hands,
 They heap the billows high,
They dash them up, till their spray-crowned heads,
 Seem resting 'gainst the sky;
Yon proud white ship, like a mighty bird,
 Is skimming a mountain wave,
But the wind-spirits! see how they hold it back,
 While they scoop out its hollow grave;
Their work is done, and the ship sinks down,
 For the waves have touched its brow,
It sinks in the deep like a weight of lead,
 "God help the sailor now."

We know how wildly the sailor's wife
 Awakes from her troubled sleep,
And looks abroad like a frightened bird
 O'er the breast of the boiling deep;
We know how closely she folds her hands
 In the might of her keen despair,
When she gazes down upon the dusky beach
 And sees no white ship there;
And we know how bitter her grief will be
 When the light of the morning's brow,
Will show the wreck of the victim ship;
 God help the watcher now.

O! Thou who didst walk on the restless deep
 When the surging waves rolled high,
Look down, look down from thy dwelling place,
 And list to the sailor's cry,
The winds, the seas, and the tempests loud,
 Are servants that do thy will,
Say Thou to the wind-spirits, fold your wings,
 And say to the waves, "be still;"
By his earnest call, by his fervent prayer,
 By the tear on his lifted brow,
By his cold clasped hands, by his pale wet cheek,
 "God help the sailor now."