Sea Canes

Half my friends are dead.

I will make you new ones, said earth

No, give me them back, as they were, instead,

with faults and all, I cried.

Tonight I can snatch their talk

from the faint surf's drone

through the canes, but I cannot walk

on the moonlit leaves of ocean

down that white road alone,

or float with the dreaming motion

of owls leaving earth's load.

O earth, the number of friends you keep

exceeds those left to be loved.

The sea-canes by the cliff flash green and silver;

they were the seraph lances of my faith,

but out of what is lost grows something stronger

that has the rational radiance of stone,

enduring moonlight, further than despair,

strong as the wind, that through dividing canes

brings those we love before us, as they were,

with faults and all, not nobler, just there.