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.