Seasinger

On the prow of a ship I leaned,
On that day so long ago,
And my life was changed forever
By the flash of an arm as white as snow.

My eyes I shielded from sun
As I stared at the flash of light,
For so I thought of it at first.
But it was an arm as white as snow is white.

Two arms the glinting hue of snow,
Two arms the shining hue of foam,
And the toss of sunlight-yellow hair
In motion as graceful as a poem.

A woman drifted in the sea,
Her head pillowed on the gentle wave,
Her eyes the flash of sunken jewels,
That brightness for which prophets rave.

She met my stare and turned her face
In modesty, it seemed, as rare
As the glinting jewels of her eyes
Or the cascade of her foam-specked hair.

Then she dived again beneath the sea,
And I heard the sound of a song
That so long as I live has haunted me,
Will haunt me, I think, through death as long.

I never thought it so very strange
Though she sang and on no harp played,
Till someone told me the girl I saw and loved
Must have been a siren, or a mermaid.

I do not really hope to see her again.
It is enough to see her jeweled eyes in my mind,
To hear the song that she sang to me,
To know that something lovely I cannot find

Lives in the sea and will always live there.
That is one thing that sets her above
The lady any other man can call his own.
My mermaid is immortal as my love.