<p><SPAN name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"></SPAN></p>
<br/>
<h2> The Song of the Derelict </h2>
<p>Ye have sung me your songs, ye have chanted your rimes<br/>
(I scorn your beguiling, O sea!)<br/>
Ye fondle me now, but to strike me betimes.<br/>
(A treacherous lover, the sea!)<br/>
Once I saw as I lay, half-awash in the night<br/>
A hull in the gloom — a quick hail — and a light<br/>
And I lurched o'er to leeward and saved her for spite<br/>
From the doom that ye meted to me.<br/>
<br/>
I was sister to 'Terrible', seventy-four,<br/>
(Yo ho! for the swing of the sea!)<br/>
And ye sank her in fathoms a thousand or more<br/>
(Alas! for the might of the sea!)<br/>
Ye taunt me and sing me her fate for a sign!<br/>
What harm can ye wreak more on me or on mine?<br/>
Ho braggart! I care not for boasting of thine —<br/>
A fig for the wrath of the sea!<br/>
<br/>
Some night to the lee of the land I shall steal,<br/>
(Heigh-ho to be home from the sea!)<br/>
No pilot but Death at the rudderless wheel,<br/>
(None knoweth the harbor as he!)<br/>
To lie where the slow tide creeps hither and fro<br/>
And the shifting sand laps me around, for I know<br/>
That my gallant old crew are in Port long ago —<br/>
For ever at peace with the sea!<br/></p>
<div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />
1 of 2
2 of 2
Previous
Next
Update Required
To play the media you will need to either update your browser to a recent version or update your Flash plugin.