A Parable Of Immortality

I am
standing upon
the seashore.
A ship
at my side
spreads her
white sails
to the
morning breeze
and starts
for the
blue ocean.
She is
an object
of beauty
and strength,
and I stand
and watch
until at last
she hangs
like a speck
of white cloud
just where
the sea and sky come down to mingle with each other.
Then someone at my side says, "There she goes!"
Gone where? Gone from my sight...that is all.
She is just as large in mast and hull and spar as she was when she left my side, and just as able to bear her load of living freight to the place of destination. Her diminished size is in me, not in her.
And just at the moment when someone at my side says, "There she goes!"
there are other eyes watching her coming, and other voices ready to take up the glad shout: "Here she comes!"
--Henry Van Dyke
A Parable of Immortality