John Masefield is a poet known to many people of all ages who came through the English education system as he is a favourite for anthologies and collections of poems and verse. One, which has been much parodied as well as much-loved is ‘Sea fever’, with the memorable line, “I must go down to the sea again…” and another, ‘Cargoes’ which particularly stirred my imagination when I was a child, ” Quinquireme of Nineveh from distant Ophir”.
Here is the fourth in his series of sonnets:
IV
If I could come again to that dear place
Where once I came, where Beauty lived and moved,
Where, by the sea, I saw her face to face,
That soul alive by which the world has loved;
If, as I stood at gaze among the leaves,
She would appear again, as once before,
While the red herdsman gathered up his sheaves
And brimming waters trembled up the shore;
If, as I gazed, her Beauty that was dumb,
In that old time, before I learned to speak,
Would lean to me and revelation come,
Words to the lips and colour to the cheek,
Joy with its searing-iron would burn me wise,
I should know all; all powers, all mysteries.
John Masefield
Lois Elsden 