Within Sound of the Sea

(Found here)

I have a desire to walk on the shore,

To visit the caged beast whose murmurings

Kept me awake. What does it mean

That I have the power to do this

All day long, if I wish to?

I know what thoughts will arise,

What questions. They have done so before,

Unanswered. It is in the freedom

To go or not to I exist;

To balance all the exhilaration

Of brisk moments upon the sand

With the knowledgeable hours that my books

Give me. Between their pages

The beast sleeps and never looks out 

Through the print's bars. Have I been wise

In the past, letting my nostrils

Plan my day? That salt scrubbing

Left me unclean. Am I wise now,

With all this pain in the air,

To keep my room, reading perhaps

Of that Being whose will is our peace?

~R. S. Thomas