Free Verse · Death & Loss
The Ocean Said to Me Once
by Stephen Crane · 1895
Full-text availability follows the United States display decision recorded below; status can differ elsewhere.
“The Ocean Said to Me Once” by Stephen Crane — quilloak.com/poems/the-ocean-said-to-me-once
Quick facts
- Poem
- The Ocean Said to Me Once
- Poet
- Stephen Crane
- Published
- 1895
- Length
- 19 lines
- Form
- Free Verse, Short Poems
- Themes
- Death & Loss, Grief, Short
Craft notes
How this poem works
Measured from the text on this page, not copied from a summary. Counts are approximate: syllables and rhymes come from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, which models General American English, so dialect, older pronunciation, and performance can all change what you hear.
- Shape
- 19 lines · 2 stanzas of 8–11 lines
Want the rules this form is measured against? Read what makes a free verse, or run your own draft through the form checker to see the same measurements on your lines. How we measure · Report a mistake
Text, source & rights
A traceable edition
Full-text display is based on the committed source record and a United States term-expiry review.
- Author record
- Stephen Crane1871–1900
- Source record
- PoetryDBThe Ocean Said to Me Once by stephen-crane, PoetryDB transcription
- Display decision
- Full text · United States · reviewed 2026-07-18
- Publication record
- 1895
- Text fingerprint
- SHA-256 944b28ec399bd8fc…
- Editorial handling
- Whitespace and stanza breaks normalized for web display; no material wording change recorded.
Keep reading
He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven
W. B. Yeats · 1899
8 lines · lyric
The Quiet Work
The QuillOak Editors
9 lines · free verse
Steady
The QuillOak Editors
8 lines · free verse