Posthumous Poems/Evening by the Sea

by Algernon Charles Swinburne

EVENING BY THE SEA

It was between the night and day,
 The trees looked weary—one by one
Against the west they seemed to sway,
 And yet were steady. The sad sun
In a sick doubt of colour lay
 Across the water's belt of dun.

On the weak wind scarce flakes of foam
 There floated, hardly borne at all
From the rent edge of water—some
 Between slack gusts the wind let fall,
The white brine could not overcome
 That pale grass on the southern wall.

That evening one could always hear
 The sharp hiss of the shingle, rent
As each wave settled heavier,
 The same rough way. This noise was blent
With many sounds that hurt the air
 As the salt sea-wind came and went.

The wind wailed once and was not. Then
 The white sea touching its salt edge
Dropped in a slow low sigh: again
 The ripples deepened to the ledge,
Across the beach from marsh and fen
 Came a faint smell of rotten sedge.

Like a hurt thing that will not die
 The sea lay moaning; waifs of weed
Strove thro' the water painfully
 Or lay flat, like drenched hair indeed,
Rolled over with the pebbles, nigh
 Low places where the rock-fish feed.