The Great Seducer

Who looks too long from his window
At the grey, wide, cold sea,
Where breakers scour the beaches
With fingers of sharp foam;
Who looks too long through the grey pane
At the mad, wild, bold sea,
Shall sell his hearth to a stranger
And turn his back on home.

Who looks too long from his window—
Though his wife waits by the fireside—
At a ship's wings in the offing,
At a gull's wings on air,
Shall latch his gate behind him,
Though his cattle call from the byre-side,
And kiss his wife-and leave her—
And wander everywhere.

Who looks too long in the twilight,
Or the dawn-light, or the noon-light,
Who sees an anchor lifted
And hungers past content,
Shall pack his chest for the world's end,
For alien sun-or moonlight,
And follow the wind, sateless,
To Disillusionment!