Page:Backblock Ballads and Later Verses (C.J. Dennis, 1918).djvu/151



I hold by stern morality, Despite the worldlings' scoffing; But when I sit beside the sea And gaze into the offing The bathers, mingling on the beach, Stir thoughts I cannot put in speech.

Indeed, my sad soul loathes a sight So ill to minds ascetic; Yet from the narrow path of right I feel a tug magnetic That seeks to draw me o'er the sand, Out to the siren-haunted strand.

"Come, mingle," sings the restless sea. This urging sorely vexes. E'en fish, when caught and tinned, may be    Unwed and mixed in sexes. But who has heard of potted sin, Or found temptation in a tin?