The speaker begins by remembering a time when love felt like an incoming tide—fresh, bright, and full of energy. The sun was sharp, sea gulls soared high, and foam blew against the shore. That earlier mood is alive and confident. But the second stanza shifts into evening and reversal. The tide is now going out, the gulls fly lower, and the waves that once rose with eager force are broken for good. It’s a quiet, sorrowful image of love changing or ending. The sea remains, but its movement has turned away. The speaker’s feeling is one of loss and resignation, as if something powerful has spent itself and cannot return. The dusk setting deepens that sense of fading hope and stillness after passion.
Tides — Summary
Love in my heart was a fresh tide flowing Where the starlike sea gulls soar; The sun was keen and the foam was blowing High on the rocky shore.
But now in the dusk the tide is turning, Lower the sea gulls soar, And the waves that rose in resistless yearning Are broken forevermore.