A Bay Swimmer’s Hymn

The call is sounded, once; again,
And echoes through the waking West
Where something heavier than men
Bids you to lie, but not to rest -

To set your course by distant bells
And flee the fast-pursuing town;
Commend your weight to patient swells
And lay your strange, dark burden down.

Where watchmen wait the coming surge
That lifts the night and calls the dawn,
Where countless magic hands emerge
And Alcatraz is Avalon,

Where halted siren songs resume
And you nor I are of this earth
And these, the waters of our doom
Become the waters of our birth.