Night on the Convoy
(ALEXANDRIA-MARSEILLES)
Out in the blustering darkness, on the deck
A gleam of stars looks down. Long blurs of black,
The lean Destroyers, level with our track,
Plunging and stealing, watch the perilous way
Through backward racing seas and caverns of chill spray.
One sentry by the davits, in the gloom
Stands mute: the boat heaves onward through the night.
Shrouded is every chink of cabined light:
And sluiced by floundering waves that hiss and boom
And crash like guns, the troop-ship shudders ... doom.
Now something at my feet stirs with a sigh;
And slowly growing used to groping dark,
I know that the hurricane-deck, down all its length,
Is heaped and spread with lads in sprawling strength—
Blanketed soldiers sleeping. In the stark
Danger of life at war, they lie so still,
All prostrate and defenceless, head by head...
And I remember Arras, and that hill
Where dumb with pain I stumbled among the dead.
We are going home. The troop-ship, in a thrill
Of fiery-chamber’d anguish, throbs and rolls.
We are going home ... victims ... three thousand souls.
May 1918.
poem by Siegfried Sassoon
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Sargasso Sea
I stand on the deck of my ship
stranded in uncharted seas
wondering where the west wind
will be carrying me.
Will it be to some treasure island,
but from the dark clouds forming
will it be to some distant doom,
or will be to the Sargasso Sea.
The sea of weed unmapped
where many good ships and men
from have failed to homeward sail.
The wind is bellowing my sails
as my wooden ship begins to creak.
Oh how I long for sight of land
and a way back home.
Each wave smacks again the hull
with a dragon’s roar.
My ship reels roughly in the waters
as lightning crackles above my head.
The sky is now as black as pitch
and the wind whips spray into my face.
The dark clouds of torment drive my ship and me.
Will be to a watery grave or still waters calm.
Only the ticking hours of time will reveal when it is right.
Now I must ride with the storm
and wherever it is taking me.
I can only pray to my lord for help
to deliver me from that dreaded Sargasso Sea.
I fear no foreign lands only a sea unknown to me.
The storm of torment bellows,
restlessly through day and night,
but I am not a sailor to give up without a fight.
I curse the wind to leave my ship and me alone.
It ignores my curses and carries me further on.
Even the moon and stars are afraid to show their light,
but I stand firm upon my deck
to see the sunlight in the morn.
I curse some more
as the west wind hammers at an open cabin door.
Slowly the lightening fades
and the dark clouds dissipate overhead.
The west wind runs out of breath
as the sun glitters on the waters
that wander over watery graves.
The sea becomes placid
no more raging foam,
a gentle breeze arises
so I can chart my way home.
27 July 2009
Author’s Note.
The Sargasso Sea is one of the great myths and legends of the sea. Ancient mariners used to talk about it entangling around ships so that they could not move and remained stranded there. Countless stories and poems have been written about it, each embellishing it more. I, myself written two poems about it, the first being Sea Of Dead Ships.
The truth is that Sargasso is Gulf Weed, is a brown seaweed that forms thick floating masses in the tropical Atlantic waters.
DVH
poem by David Harris
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Stand by the Engines
On the moonlighted decks there are children at play,
While smoothly the steamer is holding her way;
And the old folks are chatting on deck-seats and chairs,
And the lads and the lassies go strolling in pairs.
Some gaze half-entranced on the beautiful sea,
And wonder perhaps if a vision it be:
And surely their journeys no sorrow nor care,
For wealth, love, and beauty are passengers there.
But down underneath, ’mid the coal dust that smears
The face and the hands, work the ship’s engineers.
Whate’er be the duty of others, ’tis theirs
To stand by their engines whatever occurs.
The sailor may gaze on the sea and the sky;
The sailor may tell when the danger is nigh;
But when Death his black head o’er the waters uprears,
Unseen he is met by the ship’s engineers.
They are thrown from their feet by the force of a shock;
They know that their vessel has struck on a rock.
Now stand by your engines when danger appears,
For all may depend on the ship’s engineers!
No thought of their danger! No mad rush on deck!
They stand at their posts in the hull of a wreck,
Firm hands on the valves; and the white steam appears;
And down with their ship go the brave engineers!
poem by Henry Lawson
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Golgotha
Through darkness curves a spume of falling flares
That flood the field with shallow, blanching light.
The huddled sentry stares
On gloom at war with white,
And white receding slow, submerged in gloom.
Guns into mimic thunder burst and boom,
And mirthless laughter rakes the whistling night.
The sentry keeps his watch where no one stirs
But the brown rats, the nimble scavengers.
poem by Siegfried Sassoon
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The Dead Ship Of Harpswell
What flecks the outer gray beyond
The sundown's golden trail?
The white flash of a sea-bird's wing,
Or gleam of slanting sail?
Let young eyes watch from Neck and Point,
And sea-worn elders pray,--
The ghost of what was once a ship
Is sailing up the bay.
From gray sea-fog, from icy drift,
From peril and from pain,
The home-bound fisher greets thy lights,
O hundred-harbored Maine!
But many a keel shall seaward turn,
And many a sail outstand,
When, tall and white, the Dead Ship looms
Against the dusk of land.
She rounds the headland's bristling pines;
She threads the isle-set bay;
No spur of breeze can speed her on,
Nor ebb of tide delay.
Old men still walk the Isle of Orr
Who tell her date and name,
Old shipwrights sit in Freeport yards
Who hewed her oaken frame.
What weary doom of baffled quest,
Thou sad sea-ghost, is thine?
What makes thee in the haunts of home
A wonder and a sign?
No foot is on thy silent deck,
Upon thy helm no hand;
No ripple hath the soundless wind
That smites thee from the land!
For never comes the ship to port,
Howe'er the breeze may be;
Just when she nears the waiting shore
She drifts again to sea.
No tack of sail, nor turn of helm,
Nor sheer of veering side;
Stern-fore she drives to sea and night,
Against the wind and tide.
In vain o'er Harpswell Neck the star
Of evening guides her in;
In vain for her the lamps are lit
Within thy tower, Seguin!
In vain the harbor-boat shall hail,
In vain the pilot call;
No hand shall reef her spectral sail,
Or let her anchor fall.
Shake, brown old wives, with dreary joy,
Your gray-head hints of ill;
And, over sick-beds whispering low,
Your prophecies fulfil.
Some home amid yon birchen trees
Shall drape its door with woe;
And slowly where the Dead Ship sails,
The burial boat shall row!
From Wolf Neck and from Flying Point,
From island and from main,
From sheltered cove and tided creek,
Shall glide the funeral train.
The dead-boat with the bearers four,
The mourners at her stern,--
And one shall go the silent way
Who shall no more return!
And men shall sigh, and women weep,
Whose dear ones pale and pine,
And sadly over sunset seas
Await the ghostly sign.
They know not that its sails are filled
By pity's tender breath,
Nor see the Angel at the helm
Who steers the Ship of Death!
. . . . .
'Chill as a down-east breeze should be,'
The Book-man said. 'A ghostly touch
The legend has. I'm glad to see
Your flying Yankee beat the Dutch.'
'Well, here is something of the sort
Which one midsummer day I caught
In Narragansett Bay, for lack of fish.'
'We wait,' the Traveller said;
'serve hot or cold your dish.'
poem by John Greenleaf Whittier
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The Slow Pacific Swell
Far out of sight forever stands the sea,
Bounding the land with pale tranquillity.
When a small child, I watched it from a hill
At thirty miles or more. The vision still
Lies in the eye, soft blue and far away:
The rain has washed the dust from April day;
Paint-brush and lupine lie against the ground;
The wind above the hill-top has the sound
Of distant water in unbroken sky;
Dark and precise the little steamers ply-
Firm in direction they seem not to stir.
That is illusion. The artificer
Of quiet, distance holds me in a vise
And holds the ocean steady to my eyes.
Once when I rounded Flattery, the sea
Hove its loose weight like sand to tangle me
Upon the washing deck, to crush the hull;
Subsiding, dragged flesh at the bone. The skull
Felt the retreating wash of dreaming hair.
Half drenched in dissolution, I lay bare.
I scarcely pulled myself erect; I came
Back slowly, slowly knew myself the same.
That was the ocean. From the ship we saw
Gray whales for miles: the long sweep of the jaw,
The blunt head plunging clean above the wave.
And one rose in a tent of sea and gave
A darkening shudder; water fell away;
The whale stood shining, and then sank in spray.
A landsman, I. The sea is but a sound.
I would be near it on a sandy mound,
And hear the steady rushing of the deep
While I lay stinging in the sand with sleep.
I have lived inland long. The land is numb.
It stands beneath the feet, and one may come
Walking securely, till the sea extends
Its limber margin, and precision ends.
By night a chaos of commingling power,
The whole Pacific hovers hour by hour.
The slow Pacific swell stirs on the sand,
Sleeping to sink away, withdrawing land,
Heaving and wrinkled in the moon, and blind;
Or gathers seaward, ebbing out of mind.
poem by Yvor Winters
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Tales Of A Wayside Inn : Part 2. The Musician's Tale; The Ballad of Carmilhan - IV.
And now along the horizon's edge
Mountains of cloud uprose,
Black as with forests underneath,
Above their sharp and jagged teeth
Were white as drifted snows.
Unseen behind them sank the sun,
But flushed each snowy peak
A little while with rosy light
That faded slowly from the sight
As blushes from the cheek.
Black grew the sky,--all black, all black;
The clouds were everywhere;
There was a feeling of suspense
In nature, a mysterious sense
Of terror in the air.
And all on board the Valdemar
Was still as still could be;
Save when the dismal ship-bell tolled,
As ever and anon she rolled,
And lurched into the sea.
The captain up and down the deck
Went striding to and fro;
Now watched the compass at the wheel,
Now lifted up his hand to feel
Which way the wind might blow.
And now he looked up at the sails,
And now upon the deep;
In every fibre of his frame
He felt the storm before it came,
He had no thought of sleep.
Eight bells! and suddenly abaft,
With a great rush of rain,
Making the ocean white with spume,
In darkness like the day of doom,
On came the hurricane.
The lightning flashed from cloud to cloud,
And rent the sky in two;
A jagged flame, a single jet
Of white fire, like a bayonet_
That pierced the eyeballs through.
Then all around was dark again,
And blacker than before;
But in that single flash of light
He had beheld a fearful sight,
And thought of the oath he swore.
For right ahead lay the Ship of the Dead,
The ghostly Carmilhan!
Her masts were stripped, her yards were bare,
And on her bowsprit, poised in air,
Sat the Klaboterman.
Her crew of ghosts was all on deck
Or clambering up the shrouds;
The boatswain's whistle, the captain's hail,
Were like the piping of the gale,
And thunder in the clouds.
And close behind the Carmilhan
There rose up from the sea,
As from a foundered ship of stone,
Three bare and splintered masts alone:
They were the Chimneys Three.
And onward dashed the Valdemar
And leaped into the dark;
A denser mist, a colder blast,
A little shudder, and she had passed
Right through the Phantom Bark.
She cleft in twain the shadowy hulk,
But cleft it unaware;
As when, careering to her nest,
The sea-gull severs with her breast
The unresisting air.
Again the lightning flashed; again
They saw the Carmilhan,
Whole as before in hull and spar;
But now on board of the Valdemar
Stood the Klaboterman.
And they all knew their doom was sealed;
They knew that death was near;
Some prayed who never prayed before,
And some they wept, and some they swore,
And some were mute with fear.
Then suddenly there came a shock,
And louder than wind or sea
A cry burst from the crew on deck,
As she dashed and crashed, a hopeless wreck,
Upon the Chimneys Three.
The storm and night were passed, the light
To streak the east began;
The cabin-boy, picked up at sea,
Survived the wreck, and only he,
To tell of the Carmilhan.
poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
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When The Ship Comes In
(dylan)
Oh the time will come up
When the winds will stop
And the breeze will cease to be a breezin
Like the stillness in the wind
For the hurricane begins
The hour when the ship comes in
Oh the seas will split
And the ship will hit
And the shoreline sands will be shaken
Then the tide will sound and the wind will pound
And the morning will be breakin
Oh the fishes will laugh
As they swim out of the path
And the seagulls theyll be smilin
And the rocks on the sand
Will proudly stand
The hour that the ship comes in
And the words they use
For to get the ship confused
Will not be understood as they are spoken
For the chains of the sea
Will have busted in the night
And be buried at the bottom of the ocean
Verse 2
A song will lift as the main sail shifts
And the boat drifts onto the shoreline
And the sun will respect every face on the deck
The hour when the ship comes in
Then the sands will roll out a carpet of gold
For your weary toes to be a touchin
And the ships wise men will remind you once again
That the whole wide world is watchin
song performed by by Hollies
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Down in the dark
Down in the dark, it’s all in my head,
The pain the sorrow, all of the dread,
I want it to leave, but it wants to stay,
I try and I try, but he won’t go away,
There by day, there at night,
Saying the things, that fills me with fright,
I’m down in the dark, it fills my head,
The pain the sorrow, all of the dread,
He’s always around, lurking inside,
Watching; waiting, my hands are tied,
In my head, always near,
In my thoughts, building the fear,
Down in the dark, filling my head,
The pain the sorrow, all of the dread,
The pain; it grows, bursting within,
The dark; he’s back, with his terror filled grin,
“I’ll help”; he says, talking to me,
“I know what to do, just come and see, ”
Down in the dark, it filled my head,
The pain the sorrow, all of the dread,
My thoughts are violent, with sorrow in my chest,
I just close my eyes, and hope for the best,
He tells me good job, I’ll find the light,
But my life is ending, with the chill of the night.,
Dead in the dark, lost in my head,
No more pain or sorrow, not even dread….,
poem by Jacob Hill
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Sonnet. Faith
Securely cabined in the ship below,
Through darkness and through storm I cross the sea,
A pathless wilderness of waves to me:
But yet I do not fear, because I know
That he who guides the good ship o'er that waste
Sees in the stars her shining pathway traced.
Blindfold I walk this life's bewildering maze;
Up flinty steep, through frozen mountain pass,
Through thornset barren and through deep morass:
But strong in faith I tread the uneven ways,
And bare my head unshrinking to the blast,
Because my Father's arm is round me cast;
And if the way seems rough, I only clasp
The hand that leads me with a firmer grasp.
poem by Anne Lynch Botta from Poems (1848)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Picnic Boat
Sunday night and the park policemen tell each other it
is dark as a stack of black cats on Lake Michigan.
A big picnic boat comes home to Chicago from the peach
farms of Saugatuck.
Hundreds of electric bulbs break the night's darkness, a
flock of red and yellow birds with wings at a standstill.
Running along the deck railings are festoons and leaping
in curves are loops of light from prow and stern
to the tall smokestacks.
Over the hoarse crunch of waves at my pier comes a
hoarse answer in the rhythmic oompa of the brasses
playing a Polish folk-song for the home-comers.
poem by Carl Sandburg
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Blue
The earth again like a ship steams out of the dark sea over
The edge of the blue, and the sun stands up to see us glide
Slowly into another day; slowly the rover
Vessel of darkness takes the rising tide.
I, on the deck, am startled by this dawn confronting
Me who am issued amazed from the darkness, stripped
And quailing here in the sunshine, delivered from haunting
The night unsounded whereon our days are shipped.
Feeling myself undawning, the day’s light playing upon me,
I who am substance of shadow, I all compact
Of the stuff of the night, finding myself all wrongly
Among the crowds of things in the sunshine jostled and racked.
I with the night on my lips, I sigh with the silence of death;
And what do I care though the very stones should cry me unreal, though the clouds
Shine in conceit of substance upon me, who am less than the rain.
Do I know the darkness within them? What are they but shrouds?
The clouds go down the sky with a wealthy ease
Casting a shadow of scorn upon me for my share in death; but I
Hold my own in the midst of them, darkling, defy
The whole of the day to extinguish the shadow I lift on the breeze.
Yea, though the very clouds have vantage over me,
Enjoying their glancing flight, though my love is dead,
I still am not homeless here, I’ve a tent by day
Of darkness where she sleeps on her perfect bed.
And I know the host, the minute sparkling of darkness
Which vibrates untouched and virile through the grandeur of night,
But which, when dawn crows challenge, assaulting the vivid motes
Of living darkness, bursts fretfully, and is bright:
Runs like a fretted arc-lamp into light,
Stirred by conflict to shining, which else
Were dark and whole with the night.
Runs to a fret of speed like a racing wheel,
Which else were aslumber along with the whole
Of the dark, swinging rhythmic instead of a-reel.
Is chafed to anger, bursts into rage like thunder;
Which else were a silent grasp that held the heavens
Arrested, beating thick with wonder.
Leaps like a fountain of blue sparks leaping
In a jet from out of obscurity,
Which erst was darkness sleeping.
Runs into streams of bright blue drops,
Water and stones and stars, and myriads
Of twin-blue eyes, and crops
Of floury grain, and all the hosts of day,
All lovely hosts of ripples caused by fretting
The Darkness into play.
poem by David Herbert Lawrence
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The Day After The Hurricane
And they return home
after the quick evacuation
home to their homelessness,
home to the loss of their properties
built up for years and decades
now pounded and crumpled by waves.
And they return home,
home to their parks and businesses
bulldozed by giant monsters in the night.
And they return home
home to their ports and shores
finding houses of their neighbors
uprooted and thrown into deep seas.
And they return home,
home to their childhood and memories
recorded in albums and documents
videos, CDs and files in computers
now drowned by waters
and covered by piles of dirt and mud.
And they return home,
home to their own town or city
which once was lighted with much glee.
And here they now return
to this gloom of darkness
with live wires that may soon
explode into big flames of fires.
Such a tragic home coming
from the fury of the Super Power Sandy!
Have mercy, O Lord, on the victims
of this merciless hurricane.
poem by Elizabeth Padillo Olesen
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Talkin' Bear Mountain Picnic Massacre Blues
by Bob Dylan
I saw it advertised one day,
Bear Mountain picnic was comin' my way.
"Come along 'n' take a trip,
We'll bring you up there on a ship.
Bring the wife and kids
Bring the whole family."
Yippee!
Well, I run right down 'n' bought a ticket
To this Bear Mountain Picnic.
But little did I realize
I was in for a picnic surprise.
Had nothin' to do with mountains.
I didn't even come close to a bear.
Took the wife 'n' kids down to the pier,
Six thousand people there,
Everybody had ticket for the trip.
"Oh well." I said, "it's a pretty big ship.
Besides, anyway, the more the merrier."
Well, we all got on 'n' what d'ya think,
That big old boat started t' sink
More people kept a-pilin' on,
That old ship was a-slowly goin' down.
Funny way t' start a picnic.
Well, I soon lost track of m' kids 'n' wife,
So many people there I never saw in m' life
That old ship sinkin' down in the water,
Six thousand people tryin' t' kill each other,
Dogs a-barkin', cats a-meowin',
Women screamin', fists a-flyin', babies cryin',
Cops a-comin', me a-runnin'.
Maybe we just better call off the picnic.
I got shoved down 'n' pushed around,
All I could hear there was a screamin' sound,
Don't remember one thing more,
Just remember walkin' up on a little shore,
Head busted, stomach cracked,
Feet splintered, I was bald, naked. . .
Quite lucky to be alive though.
Feelin' like I climbed outa m' casket,
I grabbed back hold of m' picnic basket.
Took the wife 'n' kids 'n' started home,
Wishin' I'd never got up that morn.
Now, I don't care just what you do,
If you wanta have a picnic, that's up t' you.
But don't tell me about it, I don't wanta hear it,
'Cause, see, I just lost all m' picnic spirit.
Stay in m' kitchen, have m' own picnic. . .
In the bathroom.
Now, it don't seem to me quite so funny
What some people are gonna do f'r money.
There's a bran' new gimmick every day
Just t' take somebody's money away.
I think we oughta take some o' these people
And put 'em on a boat, send 'em up to Bear Mountain . . .
For a picnic.
song performed by by Bob Dylan
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Jonah
We sail into a calm sea
and are far away from land
when that heavy storm unleashes
with its fury,
but below in the hold I am sleeping
and when I wake
I hear men running up and down
and then one bows over me
with a bright oil lamp in his hands
and the ship jerks with every wave
that slaps against it and others breaking over it
and a hand is stretched out to me
and I am pulled to my feet.
On deck I see thunderbolts
falling everywhere around us and the wind
howls as if it’s mad
and the tiller man shouts pray man pray
and maybe your god will hear you
as we have already prayed and pleaded
and this ship will just now
break under us, into pieces
and the ship creaks, shudders
and tumbles up and down
when the captain asks for a dice
and the lot falls on me
and with the howling wind
and lightings resounding
and the sea that foams wildly
I am thrown into the water
and while I sink and think that now
I am going to drown, I pray and beg for help
and a big fish swallows me,
a really big thing
and then I think that now I am in real jeopardy,
then God takes his decision
and it chucks me out
at Nineveh
I see the light.
poem by Gert Strydom
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Farewell To Florida
I
Go on, high ship, since now, upon the shore,
The snake has left its skin upon the floor.
Key West sank downward under massive clouds
And silvers and greens spread over the sea. The moon
Is at the mast-head and the past is dead.
Her mind will never speak to me again.
I am free. High above the mast the moon
Rides clear of her mind and the waves make a refrain
Of this: that the snake has shed its skin upon
The floor. Go on through the darkness. The waves fly back
II
Her mind had bound me round. The palms were hot
As if I lived in ashen ground, as if
The leaves in which the wind kept up its sound
From my North of cold whistled in a sepulchral South,
Her South of pine and coral and coraline sea,
Her home, not mine, in the ever-freshened Keys,
Her days, her oceanic nights, calling
For music, for whisperings from the reefs.
How content I shall be in the North to which I sail
And to feel sure and to forget the bleaching sand ...
III
I hated the weathery yawl from which the pools
Disclosed the sea floor and the wilderness
Of waving weeds. I hated the vivid blooms
Curled over the shadowless hut, the rust and bones,
The trees likes bones and the leaves half sand, half sun.
To stand here on the deck in the dark and say
Farewell and to know that that land is forever gone
And that she will not follow in any word
Or look, nor ever again in thought, except
That I loved her once ... Farewell. Go on, high ship.
IV
My North is leafless and lies in a wintry slime
Both of men and clouds, a slime of men in crowds.
The men are moving as the water moves,
This darkened water cloven by sullen swells
Against your sides, then shoving and slithering,
The darkness shattered, turbulent with foam.
To be free again, to return to the violent mind
That is their mind, these men, and that will bind
Me round, carry me, misty deck, carry me
To the cold, go on, high ship, go on, plunge on.
poem by Wallace Stevens
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The Mermaidens' Vesper-Hymn
Troop home to silents grots and caves!
Troop home! And mimic as you go
The mournful winding of the waves
Which to their dark abysses flow!
At this sweet hour, all things beside
In amourous pairs to covert creep;
The swans that brush the evening tide
Homeward and snowy couples keep;
In his green den the murmuring seal
Close by his sleek companion lies;
While singly we to bedward steal,
And close in fruitless sleep our eyes.
In bowers of love men take their rest,
In loveless bowers we sigh alone!
With busom-friends are others blessed, -
But we have none! But we have none!
poem by George Darley
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I Explain
I explain the silvered passing of a ship at night,
The sweep of each sad lost wave,
The dwindling boom of the steel thing's striving,
The little cry of a man to a man,
A shadow falling across the greyer night,
And the sinking of the small star;
Then the waste, the far waste of waters,
And the soft lashing of black waves
For long and in loneliness.
Remember, thou, O ship of love,
Thou leavest a far waste of waters,
And the soft lashing of black waves
For long and in loneliness.
poem by Stephen Crane
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Talking Bear Mountain Picnic Massacre Blues
I saw it advertised one day,
Bear mountain picnic was comin my way.
Come along n take a trip,
Well bring you up there on a ship.
Bring the wife and kids
Bring the whole family.
Yippee!
Well, I run right down n bought a ticket
To this bear mountain picnic.
But little did I realize
I was in for a picnic surprise.
Had nothin to do with mountains.
I didnt even come close to a bear.
Took the wife n kids down to the pier,
Six thousand people there,
Everybody had ticket for the trip.
Oh well. I said, its a pretty big ship.
Besides, anyway, the more the merrier.
Well, we all got on n what dya think,
That big old boat started t sink
More people kept a-pilin on,
That old ship was a-slowly goin down.
Funny way t start a picnic.
Well, I soon lost track of m kids n wife,
So many people there I never saw in m life
That old ship sinkin down in the water,
Six thousand people tryin t kill each other,
Dogs a-barkin, cats a-meowin,
Women screamin, fists a-flyin, babies cryin,
Cops a-comin, me a-runnin.
Maybe we just better call off the picnic.
I got shoved down n pushed around,
All I could hear there was a screamin sound,
Dont remember one thing more,
Just remember walkin up on a little shore,
Head busted, stomach cracked,
Feet splintered, I was bald, naked. . .
Quite lucky to be alive though.
Feelin like I climbed outa m casket,
I grabbed back hold of m picnic basket.
Took the wife n kids n started home,
Wishin Id never got up that morn.
Now, I dont care just what you do,
If you wanta have a picnic, thats up t you.
But dont tell me about it, I dont wanta hear it,
cause, see, I just lost all m picnic spirit.
Stay in m kitchen, have m own picnic. . .
In the bathroom.
Now, it dont seem to me quite so funny
What some people are gonna do fr money.
Theres a bran new gimmick every day
Just t take somebodys money away.
I think we oughta take some o these people
And put em on a boat, send em up to bear mountain . . .
For a picnic.
song performed by by Bob Dylan
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Mother
I
IT was April, blossoming spring,
They buried me, when the birds did sing;
Earth, in clammy wedging earth,
They banked my bed with a black, damp girth.
Under the damp and under the mould,
I kenned my breasts were clammy and cold.
Out from the red beams, slanting and bright,
I kenned my cheeks were sunken and white.
I was a dream, and the world was a dream,
And yet I kenned all things that seem.
I was a dream, and the world was a dream,
But you cannot bury a red sunbeam.
For though in the under-grave's doom-night
I lay all silent and stark and white,
Yet over my head I seemed to know
The murmurous moods of wind and snow,
The snows that wasted, the winds that blew,
The rays that slanted, the clouds that drew
The water-ghosts up from lakes below,
And the little flower-souls in earth that grow.
Under earth, in the grave's stark night,
I felt the stars and the moon's pale light.
I felt the winds of ocean and land
That whispered the blossoms soft and bland.
Though they had buried me dark and low,
My soul with the season's seemed to grow.
II
From throes of pain they buried me low,
For death had finished a mother's woe.
But under the sod, in the grave's dread doom,
I dreamed of my baby in glimmer and gloom.
I dreamed of my babe, and I kenned that his rest
Was broken in wailings on my dead breast.
I dreamed that a rose-leaf hand did cling;
Oh, you cannot bury a mother in spring!
When the winds are soft and the blossoms are red
She could not sleep in her cold earth-bed.
I dreamed of my babe for a day and a night,
And then I rose in my grave-clothes white.
I rose like a flower from my damp earth-bed
To the world of sorrowing overhead.
Men would have called me a thing of harm,
But dreams of my babe made me rosy and warm.
I felt my breasts swell under my shroud;
No star shone white, no winds were loud;
But I stole me past the graveyard wall,
For the voice of my baby seemed to call;
And I kenned me a voice, though my lips were dumb:
Hush, baby, hush! for mother is come.
I passed the streets to my husband's home;
The chamber stairs in a dream I clomb;
I heard the sound of each sleeper's breath,
Light waves that break on the shores of death.
I listened a space at my chamber door,
Then stole like a moon-ray over its floor.
My babe was asleep on a stranger's arm,
'O baby, my baby, the grave is so warm,
'Though dark and so deep, for mother is there!
O come with me from the pain and care!
'O come with me from the anguish of earth,
Where the bed is banked with a blossoming girth,
'Where the pillow is soft and the rest is long,
And mother will croon you a slumber-song–
'A slumber-song that will charm your eyes
To a sleep that never in earth-song lies!
'The loves of earth your being can spare,
But never the grave, for mother is there.'
I nestled him soft to my throbbing breast,
And stole me back to my long, long rest.
And here I lie with him under the stars,
Dead to earth, its peace and its wars;
Dead to its hates, its hopes, and its harms,
So long as he cradles up soft in my arms.
And heaven may open its shimmering doors,
And saints make music on pearly floors,
And hell may yawn to its infinite sea,
But they never can take my baby from me.
For so much a part of my soul he hath grown
That God doth know of it high on His throne.
And here I lie with him under the flowers
That sun-winds rock through the billowy hours,
With the night-airs that steal from the murmuring sea,
Bringing sweet peace to my baby and me.
poem by William Wilfred Campbell
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Safe
Wild wintry wind, storm through the night,
Dash the black clouds against the sky,
Hiss through the billows seething white,
Fling the rock-surf in spray on high.
Hurl the high seas on harbour bars,
Madden them with thy havock-shriek
Against the crimson beacon-stars --
Thy rage no more can make me weak.
The ship rides safely in the bay,
The ship that held my hope in her --
Whirl on, wild wind, in thy wild fray,
We hear our whispers through the stir.
poem by Augusta Davies Webster
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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