Sea Fever

There are times when the whole Mid-West thing gets to me. Maybe it's just the time of year when I feel melancholy and wistful anyway. But having grown up on the coast sometimes I feel landlocked here, suffocated by all the miles and miles of land surrounding me. Then I would give my eyeteeth for a day on the North West Coast, where it's wild and rugged, where the gulls scream and sail over the waves and you can look down on them from the cliffs and see the whales in the water spouting as they migrate.

At times like these this poem comes to mind:

Sea Fever
by John Masefield

I must go down to the seas again to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sails shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea's face and a grey dawn breaking.

I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume and the seagull crying.

I must go down to the sea again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull's way and the whale's way where the wind's like a whetted knife:
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow rover,
And a quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.