Docks

Strolling along 
By the teeming docks, 
I watch the ships put out. 
Black ships that heave and lunge 
And move like mastodons 
Arising from lethargic sleep 

The fathomed harbor 
Calls them not nor dares 
Them to a strain of action,
But outward, on and outward, 
Sounding low-reverberating calls, 
Shaggy in the half-lit distance, 
They pass the pointed headland, 
View the wide, far-lifting wilderness 
And leap with cumulative speed 
To test the challenge of the sea 

Plunging, 
Doggedly onward plunging,
Into salt and mist and foam and sun