<html xmlns:tei="http://www.tei-c.org/ns/1.0"><body><h1 align="" class="head">A Blossom of Flowering Seas</h1><div class="stanza"><p class="line">NO spirit brooded on the placid deep,</p><p class="line">Like blind blue eyes awake and yet asleep,</p><p class="line">Like dead blue eyes that neither laugh nor weep,</p><p class="line">The ocean lay. The waves no blossom bore,</p><p class="line">There flowered no foam upon the barren shore.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Then wondrously and strangely as a star</p><p class="line">Out of a firemist grows,</p><p class="line">I saw a billow blossoming afar</p><p class="line">Into a rose--</p><p class="line">Into the lily, and the rose of thee,</p><p class="line">Thou fairy blossom of the flowerless sea.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">O, as upon the sea I saw thee float,</p><p class="line">Thro' the blue water gleamed thine arms and throat</p><p class="line">Like water-lilies swaying in a mist</p><p class="line">Of lapis lazuli and amethyst,</p><p class="line">And thy face, sweetly blossoming above,</p><p class="line">Lay like a rose upon the breast of Love.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Then found I all the meaning of the world,</p><p class="line">I saw all nature like a bud unroll;</p><p class="line">From the far nebula I saw unfurled</p><p class="line">The beauty of thy body and thy soul,</p><p class="line">And knew that God's importunate desire</p><p class="line">For beauty had conceived the mist of fire,</p><p class="line">And that a living heart of love must be</p><p class="line">Within the heaving bosom of the sea.</p></div></body></html> · Great War