There is an island in a silent sea

That rises—four, rough, rugged walls—on high

Above the ocean in calm majesty.

A mountain of despair against the sky!

About its summit soaring seagulls fly,

Or rest them in its lofty cypress trees,

And greet the black barge bearing those who die

Upon our earth to everlasting ease

And pleasant lives that know not man's eternities.

White halls and palaces their dwellings stand;

These shadowy souls are all unknown to graves

And live, faint phantoms in a fairy land

Of dreams and idleness. They hear the waves

Sing, and the winds come calling from the caves

Of night beyond the ocean, and the cry

Of screaming gulls; stare at each ship that braves

This wilderness of waters, and glides by

In awe-struck silence, ever fearing to draw nigh.

The sun, descending, sows the sea with gold,

And showers splendour through the fading skies,

Whilst from the murky waters they behold

The moon, a shape of silver, slow arise.

And every evening, as the daylight dies,

There comes that bark of death, whose white sail seems

An angel in the dark. A while it lies

Below them in the harbour, then there gleams

A new shape on the stairs up to that land of dreams.