Low Tide

These wet rocks where the tide has been
House full of wonderful things and new,
But no fit place for a child to play!

These wet rocks where the tide has been,
Barnacled white and weeded brown
And slimed beneath to a beautiful green,
These wet rocks where the tide went down
Will show again when the tide is high
Faint and perilous, far from shore,
No place to dream, but a place to die,-
The bottom of the sea once more.
There was a child that wandered through
A giant's empty house all day,-
House full of wonderful things and new,
But no fit place for a child to play.

A poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay