ИМХО, Уильям Коупер - один из величайших английских поэтов, а это - одно из самых выдающихся его произведений. Правда, не совсем романтичное, и если честно - не совсем о море. "The Castaway"
OBSCUREST night involv'd the sky,
The Atlantic billows roared,
When such a destin'd wretch as I,
Washing headlong from on board,
Of friends, of hope, of all bereft,
His floating home forever left.
No braver chief could Albion* boast [England]
Than he with whom he went,
Nor ever ship left Albion's coast,
With warmer wishes sent.
He lov'd them both, but both in vain,
Nor him beheld, nor her again.
Not long beneath the whelming brine,
Expert to swim, he lay;
Nor soon he felt his strength decline,
Or courage die away;
But wag'd with death a lasting strife,
Supported by despair of life.
He shouted: nor his friends had fail'd
To check the vessel's course,
But so the furious blast prevail'd,
That, pitiless perforce,
They left their outcast mate behind,
And scudded still before the wind.
Some succour yet they could afford;
And, as such storms allow,
The cask, the coop, the floated cord,
Delay'd not to bestow.
But he (they knew) nor ship, nor shore,
Whate'er they gave, should visit more.
Nor, cruel as it seem'd, could he
Their haste himself condemn,
Aware that flight, in such a sea,
Alone could rescue them;
Yet bitter felt it still to die
Deserted, and his friends so nigh.
He long survives, who lives an hour
In ocean, self-upheld;
And so long he, with unspent power,
His destiny repell'd;
And ever, as the minutes flew,
Entreated help, or cri'd, "Adieu!"
At length, his transient respite past,
His comrades, who before
Had heard his voice in every blast,
Could catch the sound no more.
For then, by toil subdu'd, he drank
The stifling wave, and then he sank.
No poet wept him, but the page
Of narrative sincere,
That tells his name, his worth, his age,
Is wet with Anson's tear.
And tears by bards or heroes shed
Alike immortalize the dead.
I therefore purpose not, or dream,
Descanting on his fate,
To give the melancholy theme
A more enduring date;
But misery still delights to trace
Its semblance in another's case.
No voice divine the storm allay'd,
No light propitious shone,
When, snatch'd from all effectual aid,
We perish'd, each alone;
But I beneath a rougher sea,
And whelm'd in deeper gulfs than he.
William Cowper
[Ed. Note: On New Year's Day of 1773, after hearing a sermon, Cowper became convinced that God had turned away from him, a belief that remained with him for the last 27 years of his life. In this poem, the last Cowper ever wrote, he gives expression to this belief by comparing himself to a sailor with Commodore William Anson's fleet which had circumnavigated the world during 1741-1744; the sailor has fallen overboard in a storm, and Cowper imagines his thoughts and feelings as he watches the fleet sail on, abandoning him to hopelessness and despair. --Nelson]
