Bounding the land with pale tranquillity

The Slow Pacific Swell:

A landsman, I. The sea is but a sound.

I would be near it on a sandy mound,

And hear the steady rushing of the deep

While I lay stinging in the sand with sleep.

I have lived inland long. The land is numb.

It stands beneath the feet, and one may come

Walking securely, till the sea extends

Its limber margin, and precision ends.

By night a chaos of commingling power,

The whole Pacific hovers hour by hour.

The slow Pacific swell stirs on the sand,

Sleeping to sink away, withdrawing land,

Heaving and wrinkled in the moon, and blind;

Or gathers seaward, ebbing out of mind.

Yvor Winters.