Your bright sail winging shoreward--by and by?

Go, life, since go you must,
Uncertain guest and whimsical ally!
All questionless you came, unquestioned go;
What does it mean to live, or what to die?
Smiling we watch you vanish, for we know
Somewhere is nobler living--by and by.




EBB AND FLOW.

How easily He turns the tides!
Just now the yellow beach was dry,
Just now the gaunt rocks all were bare,
The sun beat hot, and thirstily
Each sea-weed waved its long brown hair,
And bent and languished as in pain;
Then, in a flashing moment's space,
The white foam-feet which spurned the sand
Paused in their joyous outward race,
Wheeled, wavered, turned them to the land,
And, a swift legionary band,
Poured oil the waiting shores again.

How easily He turns the tides!
The fulness of my yesterday
Has vanished like a rapid dream,