Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, WRITTEN ON PASSING DEAD-MAN'S ISLAND, IN THE GULF OF ST. LAWRENCE, by THOMAS MOORE


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

WRITTEN ON PASSING DEAD-MAN'S ISLAND, IN THE GULF OF ST. LAWRENCE, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: See you, beneath yon cloud so dark
Last Line: As would blanch for ever her rosy light!
Alternate Author Name(s): Little, Thomas
Subject(s): Magdalen Islands (canada)


SEE you, beneath yon cloud so dark,
Fast gliding along, a gloomy Bark?
Her sails are full, though the wind is still,
And there blows not a breath her sails to fill!

Oh! what doth that vessel of darkness bear?
The silent calm of the grave is there,
Save now and again a death-knell rung,
And the flap of the sails, with night-fog hung!

There lieth a wreck on the dismal shore
Of cold and pitiless Labrador;
Where, under the moon, upon mounts of frost,
Full many a mariner's bones are tost!

Yon shadowy Bark hath been to that wreck,
And the dim blue fire, that lights her deck,
Doth play on as pale and livid a crew,
As ever yet drank the churchyard dew!

To Deadman's Isle, in the eye of the blast,
To Deadman's Isle, she speeds her fast;
By skeleton shapes her sails are furl'd,
And the hand that steers is not of this world!

Oh! hurry thee on -- oh! hurry thee on,
Thou terrible Bark! ere the night be gone,
Nor let morning look on so foul a sight
As would blanch for ever her rosy light!





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