Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE FLYING DUTCHMAN, by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE FLYING DUTCHMAN, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Don't believe in the flying dutchman?
Last Line: With your drawings from casts of a muse.
Subject(s): Legends


DON'T believe in the Flying Dutchman?
I 've known the fellow for years;
My button I 've wrenched from his clutch, man:
I shudder whenever he nears!

He 's a Rip van Winkle skipper,
A Wandering Jew of the sea,
Who sails his bedevilled old clipper
In the wind's eye, straight as a bee.

Back topsails! you can't escape him;
The man-ropes stretch with his weight,
And the queerest old toggeries drape him,
The Lord knows how long out of date!

Like a long-disembodied idea,
(A kind of ghost plentiful now,)
He stands there; you fancy you see a
Coeval of Teniers or Douw.

He greets you; would have you take letters:
You scan the addresses with dread,
While he mutters his donners and wetters, —
They 're all from the dead to the dead!

You seem taking time for reflection,
But the heart fills your throat with a jam,
As you spell in each faded direction
An ominous ending in dam.

Am I tagging my rhymes to a legend?
That were changing green turtle to mock:
No, thank you! I 've found out which wedge-end
Is meant for the head of a block.

The fellow I have in my mind's eye
Plays the old Skipper's part here on shore,
And sticks like a burr, till he finds I
Have got just the gauge of his bore.

This postman 'twixt one ghost and t' other,
With last dates that smell of the mould,
I have met him (O man and brother,
Forgive me!) in azure and gold.

In the pulpit I 've known of his preaching,
Out of hearing behind the time,
Some statement of Balaam's impeaching,
Giving Eve a due sense of her crime.

I have seen him some poor ancient thrashing
Into something (God save us!) more dry,
With the Water of Life itself washing
The life out of earth, sea, and sky.

O dread fellow-mortal, get newer
Despatches to carry, or none!
We 're as quick as the Greek and the Jew were
At knowing a loaf from a stone.

Till the couriers of God fail in duty,
We sha'n't ask a mummy for news,
Nor sate the soul's hunger for beauty
With your drawings from casts of a Muse.





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