John Marr and Other Poems | Page 7

greet.
But who a flattering tide may trust,
Or favoring breeze, or aught in
end?--
Careening under startling blasts
The sheeted towers of sails
impend;
While, gathering bale, behind is bred
A livid storm-bow,
like a rainbow dead.
At trumpet-call the topmen spring;
And, urged by after-call in stress,

Yet other tribes of tars ascend
The rigging's howling wilderness;

But ere yard-ends alert they win,
Hell rules in heaven with
hurricane-fire
and din.
The spars, athwart at spiry height,
Like quaking Lima's crosses rock;

Like bees the clustering sailors cling
Against the shrouds, or take
the shock
Flat on the swept yard-arms aslant,
Dipped like the
wheeling condor's pinions

gaunt.
A LULL! and tongues of languid flame
Lick every boom, and
lambent show
Electric 'gainst each face aloft;
The herds of clouds
with bellowings go:
The black ship rears--beset--harassed,
Then
plunges far with luminous antlers vast.
In trim betimes they turn from land,
Some shivered sails and spars
they stow;
One watch, dismissed, they troll the can,
While loud the
billow thumps the bow--
Vies with the fist that smites the board,

Obstreperous at each reveller's jovial word.
Of royal oak by storms confirmed,
The tested hull her lineage shows:

Vainly the plungings whelm her prow--
She rallies, rears, she
sturdier grows:
Each shot-hole plugged, each storm-sail home,
With
batteries housed she rams the watery
dome.
DIM seen adrift through driving scud,
The wan moon shows in plight
forlorn;
Then, pinched in visage, fades and fades
Like to the faces
drowned at morn,
When deeps engulfed the flag-ship's crew,
And,
shrilling round, the inscrutable haglets
flew.
And still they fly, nor now they cry,
But constant fan a second wake,

Unflagging pinions ply and ply,
Abreast their course intent they
take;
Their silence marks a stable mood,
They patient keep their
eager neighborhood.
Plumed with a smoke, a confluent sea,
Heaved in a combing pyramid
full,
Spent at its climax, in collapse
Down headlong thundering
stuns the hull:
The trophy drops; but, reared again,
Shows Mars'
high-altar and contemns the

main.
REBUILT it stands, the brag of arms,
Transferred in site--no thought
of where
The sensitive needle keeps its place,
And starts, disturbed,
a quiverer there;
The helmsman rubs the clouded glass--
Peers in,
but lets the trembling portent pass.
Let pass as well his shipmates do
(Whose dream of power no tremors
jar)
Fears for the fleet convoyed astern:
"Our flag they fly, they
share our star;
Spain's galleons great in hull are stout:
Manned by
our men--like us they'll ride it
out."
Tonight's the night that ends the week--
Ends day and week and
month and year:
A fourfold imminent flickering time,
For now the
midnight draws anear:
Eight bells! and passing-bells they be--
The
Old year fades, the Old Year dies at sea.
He launched them well. But shall the New
Redeem the pledge the
Old Year made,
Or prove a self-asserting heir?
But healthy hearts
few qualms invade:
By shot-chests grouped in bays 'tween guns

The gossips chat, the grizzled, sea-beat ones.
And boyish dreams some graybeards blab:
"To sea, my lads, we go
no more
Who share the Acapulco prize;
We'll all night in, and bang
the door;
Our ingots red shall yield us bliss:
Lads, golden years
begin to-night with this!"
Released from deck, yet waiting call,
Glazed caps and coats baptized
in storm,
A watch of Laced Sleeves round the board
Draw near in
heart to keep them warm:
"Sweethearts and wives!" clink, clink, they
meet,
And, quaffing, dip in wine their beards of
sleet.
"Ay, let the star-light stay withdrawn,
So here her hearth-light

memory fling,
So in this wine-light cheer be born,
And honor's
fellowship weld our ring--
Honor! our Admiral's aim foretold:
A tomb or a trophy, and lo, 't is a trophy and
gold!"
But he, a unit, sole in rank,
Apart needs keep his lonely state,

The sentry at his guarded door
Mute as by vault the sculptured Fate;

Belted he sits in drowsy light,
And, hatted, nods--the Admiral of
the White.
He dozes, aged with watches passed--
Years, years of pacing to and
fro;
He dozes, nor attends the stir
In bullioned standards rustling
low,
Nor minds the blades whose secret thrill
Perverts overhead the
magnet's Polar will:--
LESS heeds the shadowing three that play
And follow, follow fast in
wake,
Untiring wing and lidless eye--
Abreast their course intent
they take;
Or sigh or sing, they hold for good
The unvarying flight
and fixed inveterate
mood.
In dream at last his dozings merge,
In dream he reaps his victor's fruit;

The Flags-o'-the-Blue, the Flags-o'-the-Red,
Dipped flags of his
country's fleets salute
His Flag-o'-the-White in harbor proud--
But
why should it blench? Why turn to a
painted shroud?
The hungry seas they hound the hull,
The sharks they dog the haglets'
flight;
With one consent the winds, the waves
In hunt with fins and
wings unite,
While drear the harps in cordage sound
Remindful
wails for old Armadas drowned.
Ha--yonder! are they Northern Lights?
Or signals flashed to warn or
ward?
Yea, signals lanced in breakers high;
But doom on warning

follows hard:
While yet they veer in hope to shun,
They strike! and
thumps of hull and heart are
one.
But beating hearts a drum-beat calls
And prompt the men to quarters
go;
Discipline, curbing nature, rules--
Heroic makes who duty
know:
They execute the trump's command,
Or in peremptory places
wait and stand.
Yet cast about in blind amaze--
As through their watery shroud they
peer:
"We