Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, FATHER HUCKLEBERRY AT SEATTLE, by WILLIAM STEWARD GORDON


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

FATHER HUCKLEBERRY AT SEATTLE, by                    
First Line: Well, I'm takin' in seattle
Last Line: Cause they feel their growin' pains!
Subject(s): Clergy; Sea Voyages; Seattle, Washington; Spirituality; Travel; West (u.s.); Priests; Rabbis; Ministers; Bishops; Journeys; Trips; Southwest; Pacific States


Well, I'm takin' in Seattle,
As the postal mark will show
And I've been here once before,
But you wouldn't ever know.

For the place has been a-changin'
Like a girl of sweet sixteen,
And a fourteen-story buildin'
Stands as stately as a queen.

And then little baby oceans
That got tangled in the hills
Caught the new "Seattle Spirit"
And are runnin' boats and mills.

And I kind o' lose my compass,
For the car lines twist like snakes
Till I seem about to meet myself
A-comin' round the lakes.

Why, it's one conglomeration
Of the city and the sea,
And it makes me pause and wonder
What its destiny will be.

As I watched a train, a-glitterin'
Like a comet on the night,
It dove beneath the city,
And again appeared in sight.

And they're diggin' out a channel
To Lake Washington the sweet,
Where the ships of Uncle Samuel
Can come and wash their feet.

And they took old Denny Mountain
And they cast it in the sea,
For their faith is mostly workin'
And a-bringin' things to be.

Of course the latest thing in Fairs
Is the A. Y. P. unique—
Where your dollars love to linger
As you "pay 'em in a streak."

I had watched the fiery serpents
Climbin' up the Bon Marche
And was loafin' 'round among the parks
That bloom along the bay,

When a measly little fellow
Said, a-squeakin' through his nose,
"Don't it make a Beaver jealous
The way Seattle grows?"

And I straightened up my shoulders
Like a boy of twenty-two,
And I said, "The Western Spirit
Should be big enough for TWO."

So here's to Portland and Seattle
With their treasures and their trains,
But they needn't knock each other
'Cause they feel their growin' pains!





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