O Sea, That Knowest Thy Strength
Effie Lee Newsome
1885 – 1979
Hast thou been known to sing,
O sea, that knowest thy strength?
Hast thou been known to sing?
Thy voice, can it rejoice?
Naught save great sorrowing,
To me, thy sounds incessant
Do express, naught save great sorrowing.
Thy lips, they daily kiss the sand,
In wanton mockery.
Deep in thine awful heart
Thou dost not love the land.
Thou dost not love the land.
O sea, that knowest thy strength.
“These sands, these listless, helpless,
Sun-gold sands, I’ll play with these,
Or crush them in my white-fanged hands
For leagues, to please
The thing in me that is the Sea,
Intangible, untamed,
Untamed and wild,
And wild and weird and strong!”
This poem is in the public domain. Published in Poem-a-Day on March 28, 2021, by the Academy of American Poets.
