"The Sailor's Sweetheart"

The Sailor's Sweetheart

“Sweetheart, Sweetheart, Sweetheart!”

        Calleth the meadow-lark

Thro’ the rose of dawn to me

Dreaming beside the sea;

        Oh, listen—oh, hark!

How joyously, liquidly clear

Over the meadows I hear—

        “Sweetheart, Sweetheart, Sweetheart!”

And I think of my dearest across the sea,

        The blue, blue sea that holds us apart;

It is his own voice that calls to me,

        In the voice of the lark—

                “Sweetheart, Sweetheart!”

“Sadheart, Sadheart, Sadheart!”

        Calleth the meadow-lark

Thro’ the gray of dawn to me

Grieving beside the sea;

        Oh, listen—Oh, hark!

How tenderly, mournfully clear

Over the meadows I hear—

        “Sadheart, Sadheart, Sadheart!”

And I think of my dearest beneath the sea,

        The sea that holds us forever apart;

It is his own voice that calls to me

        In the voice of the lark—

                “Sadheart, Sadheart!”

"The Sailor's Sweetheart" as it appears in Ella Higginson's The Voice of April-Land and Other Poems (1903).

"The Sailor's Sweetheart" printed an unidentified publication, though this poem appears in The Seattle Times on November 1, 1903, in Higginson's own literary column titled "Clover Leaves." Clipping courtesy of the Ella Higginson Papers, Center for Pacific Northwest Studies, Heritage Resources, Western Washington University, Bellingham WA.