The days grow long and bright,
Golden the sunlight falls,
But, ah, my heart! from dawn to night
        The blue sea calls.

The pure and nunlike hills,
        Where snow herself has trod,
Thro’ perfumed air that stirs and thrills,
        Kneel up to God.

The heights, sublime, afar,
        Have held me in their thrall,
But ‘neath the low, sweet evening star
        The blue waves call.

I climb with trembling heart,
        Irresolute and slow,
For, ever, that far human voice,
        Pleads from below.

Oh, calling waves, be still!
        Plead not, and let me go,
That I may climb, like yonder hill,
        Up to God’s snow.

“The Blue Sea Calls” as it appears in Higginson’s The Voice of April-Land and Other Poems (1903).