Sand drift

I thought I should not walk these dunes again,

Nor feel the sting of this wind-bitten sand,

Where the coarse grasses always blow one way,

Bent, as my thoughts are, by an unseen hand.

I have returned; where the last wave rushed up

The wet sand is a mirror for the sky

A bright blue instant, and along its sheen

The nimble sandpipers run twinkling by.

Nothing has changed; with the same hollow thunder

The waves die in their everlasting snow --

Only the place we sat is drifted over,

Lost in the blowing sand, long, long ago.