The Seafarer
From Atlantic Roleplay Wiki
Title: The Seafarer
Author: Burton Raffel
This tale is true, and mine. It tells How the sea took me,
swept me back And forth in sorrow and fear and pain,
Showed me suffering in a hundred ships, In a thousand ports, and in me. It tells Of smashing surf when I sweated in the cold Of an anxious watch, perched in the bow As it dashed under cliffs.
My feet were cast In icy bands, bound with frost, With frozen chains, and hardship groaned Around my heart.
Hunger tore At my sea-weary soul.
No man sheltered On the quiet fairness of earth can feel How wretched I was, drifting through winter On an ice-cold sea, whirled in sorrow, Alone in a world blown clear of love, Hung with icicles.
The hailstorms flew. The only sound was the roaring sea, The freezing waves.
The song of the swan Might serve for pleasure, the cry of the sea-fowl, The death-noise of birds instead of laughter, The mewing of gulls instead of mead.
Storms beat on the rocky cliffs and were echoed By ice-feathered terns and the eagles' screams; No kinsman could offer comfort there, To a soul left drowning in desolation.
And who could believe, knowing but The passion of cities, swelled proud with wine And no taste of misfortune, how often, how wearily, I put myself back on the paths of the sea, Night would blacken; it would snow from the north;
Frost bound the earth and hail would fall, The coldest seeds. And how my heart Would begin to beat, knowing once more The salt waves tossing and the towering sea! The time for journeys would come and my soul Called me eagerly out, sent me over The horizon, seeking foreigners' homes.
But there isn't a man on earth so proud, So born in greatness, so bold with his youth, Grown so grave, or so graced by God, That he feels no fear as the sails unfurl, Wondering what Fate has willed and will do.
No harps ring in his heart, no rewards, No passion for women, no worldly pleasures, Nothing, only the oceans heave;
But longing wraps itself around him.
Orchards blossom, the towns bloom, Fields grow lovely as the world springs fresh, And all these admonish that willing mind Leaping to journeys, always set In thoughts traveling on a quickening tide.
So summer's sentinel, the cuckoo, sings In his murmuring voice, and our hearts mourn As he urges.
Who could understand, In ignorant ease, what we others suffer As the path of exile stretch endlessly on?
And yet my heart wanders away, My soul roams with the sea, the whales' Home, wandering to the wildest corners Of the world, returning ravenous with desire, Flying solitary, screaming, exciting me To the open ocean, breaking oaths On the curve of a wave.
("The Seafarer") From
"The Exeter Book", Trans.
Burton Raffel 1964.