Sunset on Edisto Beach, SC

This poem was written by Ellen Murray, a co-founder of the Penn School on St. Helena Island in South Carolina. The poem was originally published in the National Anti-Slavery Standard on July 11, 1863.

The sunset colors glowed and dimmed

Across the gray clouds of the sky,

The stars shone softly through the haze,

As loving eyes on those who die.

There lay a small cloud in the east,

And through its foldings, dark and deep,

The quivering lightnings came and went,

Scarce knowing when to wake or sleep;

Then sprang, as swords spring from the sheath,

Keen-edged from out the shadow's brim,

And flashed across the startled blue

With glory, battle-like and grim.

The ocean broke upon the land

With all its wealth of wave and foam,

The dark wing of the cormorant

Was hasting to his distant home.

Such eves, with cloud and light and wave,

May oft have smiled upon this shore

When house, and garden, hall and beach,

With joy and mirth were running o'er.

When light steps trod the crowded beach,

And children played with foam and shell,

Where now, across the lonely sand,

Paces the wary sentinel.

The little dark cloud in their sky

Of sin and wrong, they would not see,

Till justice sent the gathered storm

To consummate its destiny—

To break like whirlwind; and like chaff

It swept them from their place away,

Leaving their desolated homes

To strangers' feet and strangers' sway.

This is not vengeance. 'Tis but law,

At once unchangeable and right,

That he who sows the seeds of storm

Must reap the whirlwind's stayless might;

That he who sins must suffer loss,

Who shuts his eyes must go astray,

And he who contradicts God's "Yes,"

Must meet the Judge's changeless "Nay."

E. Murray

Part of a series of articles titled
Poems by Ellen Murray.

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Lines to E. H. F.

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Moonlight on Edisto Beach

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• Reconstruction Era National Historical Park

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