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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

HERMAN MELVILLE by JORGE LUIS BORGES

Poem Explanation Poet Analysis

First Line: HE WAS ALWAYS SURROUNDED BY THE SEA OF HIS ELDERS
Last Line: AND THE ABOMINATION OF THE WHITENESS. %IT IS THE GREAT BOOK. IT IS THE BLUE PROTEUS
The pilot of the Antarctic
Wrote at the end of his life
A long letter to a friend.
He who had been the hunted, the exile, the fugitive,
Was now happy, surrounded by books.
I think of him as I read,
Of his ambiguous seas,
Of the whale and the island
That were his fate,
And of his house in the dust of Illinois
With the books and the old weapons.




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