Convalescence
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rom out the dragging vastness of the sea,Wave-fettered, bound in sinuous, seaweed strands,He toils toward the rounding beach, and standsOne moment, white and dripping, silently,Cut like a cameo in lazuli,Then falls, betrayed by shifting shells, and landsProne in the jeering water, and his handsClutch for support where no support can be.So up, and down, and forward, inch by inch,He gains upon the shore, where poppies glowAnd sandflies dance their little lives away.The sucking waves retard, and tighter clinchThe weeds about him, but the land-winds blow,And in the sky there blooms the sun of May.
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