Page:Poems and ballads (IA balladspoems00swinrich).pdf/141



that heaves with horror of the night, As maddened by the moon that hangs aghast With strain and torment of the ravening blast, Haggard as hell, a bleak blind bloody light; No shore but one red reef of rock in sight, Whereon the waifs of many a wreck were cast And shattered in the fierce nights overpast Wherein more souls toward hell than heaven took flight; And 'twixt the shark‑toothed rocks and swallowing shoals A cry as out of hell from all these souls Sent through the sheer gorge of the slaughtering sea, Whose thousand throats, full‑fed with life by death, Fill the black air with foam and furious breath; And over all these one star—Chastity.