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Classic and Contemporary Poetry


THE DREADNOUGHT by WILFRID WILSON GIBSON

Poet Analysis

First Line: BREASTING THE TIDE OF THE TRAFFIC, THE 'DREADNOUGHT' COMES
Last Line: SITS KISSING HER HAND TO THE DRIVERS WHO FOLLOW BEHIND.

Breasting the tide of the traffic, the "Dreadnought" comes,
Be-ribboned and gay, the first of the holiday brakes,
Brimful of broken old women, a parish's mothers,
Bearing them out for the day from grey alleys and slums --
A day in the forest of Epping grown green for their sakes.

Listless and stolid they crouch, everlastingly tired,
Mere bundles of patience outworn, half-deaf and half-blind,
Save only one apple-cheeked grannie, more brisk than the others,
Who, remembering, with youth in her eyes and the old dreams desired,
Sits kissing her hand to the drivers who follow behind.



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