| Poems by Women |
THE LONG WHITE SEAM
Jean Ingelow [1820-1897]
As I came round the harbor buoy,
The lights began to
gleam,
No wave the land-locked water stirred,
The crags were white as
cream;
And I marked my love by candlelight
Sewing her long white
seam.
It's aye sewing ashore, my dear,
Watch and steer at sea,
It's
reef and furl, and haul the line,
Set sail and think of thee.
I climbed to reach her cottage door;
O sweetly my love sings!
Like a
shaft of light her voice breaks forth,
My soul to meet it springs
As the
shining water leaped of old,
When stirred by angel wings.
Aye longing to
list anew,
Awake and in my dream,
But never a song she sang like
this,
Sewing her long white seam.
Fair fall the lights, the harbor lights,
That brought me in to
thee,
And peace drop down on that low roof
For the sight that I did
see,
And the voice, my dear, that rang so clear
All for the love of
me.
For O, for O, with brows bent low
By the candle's flickering
gleam,
Her wedding-gown it was she wrought.
Sewing the long white
seam.
From: Stevenson, Burton Egbert.
The Home Book of Verse.
This poet:
[Author index]
This collection assembled by Jone Johnson Lewis.
Collection © 1999-2002 Jone Johnson Lewis.
Citing poems from these pages:
| Author. "Poem Title." Women's History: Poems by Women. Jone Johnson Lewis, editor. URL: (date of logon) |
