Pre-Existence

  I laid me down upon the shore
    And dreamed a little space;
  I heard the great waves break and roar;
    The sun was on my face.

  My idle hands and fingers brown
    Played with the pebbles grey;
  The waves came up, the waves went down,
    Most thundering and gay.

  The pebbles, they were smooth and round
    And warm upon my hands,
  Like little people I had found
    Sitting among the sands.

  The grains of sands so shining-small
    Soft through my fingers ran;
  The sun shone down upon it all,
    And so my dream began:

  How all of this had been before;
    How ages far away
  I lay on some forgotten shore
    As here I lie to-day.

  The waves came shining up the sands,
    As here to-day they shine;
  And in my pre-pelasgian hands
    The sand was warm and fine.

  I have forgotten whence I came,
    Or what my home might be,
  Or by what strange and savage name
    I called that thundering sea.

  I only know the sun shone down
    As still it shines to-day,
  And in my fingers long and brown
    The little pebbles lay.