PATROLING BARNEGAT
by: Walt Whitman (1819-1892)
- ILD, wild the storm, and the sea
high running,
- Steady the roar of the gale, with incessant undertone muttering,
- Shouts of demoniac laughter fitfully piercing and pealing,
- Waves, air, midnight, their savagest trinity lashing,
- Out in the shadows there milk-white combs careering,
- On beachy slush and sand spirts of snow fierce slanting,
- Where through the murk the easterly death-wind breasting,
- Through cutting swirl and spray watchful and firm advancing,
- (That in the distance! is that a wreck? is the red signal
flaring?)
-
- Slush and sand of the beach tireless till daylight wending,
- Steadily, slowly, through hoarse roar never remitting,
- Along the midnight edge by those milk-white combs careering,
- A group of dim, weird forms, struggling, the night confronting,
- That savage trinity warily watching.
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