Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). An American Anthology, 1787–1900. 1900.
By RichardBurton1354 On a Ferry Boat
T
Beneath the rain and mist and sullen skies.
Look out the window; ’t is a gray emprise,
This piloting of massed humanity
On such a day, from shore to busy shore,
And breeds the thought that beauty is no more.
The Southland in her face and foreign dress;
She bends above a babe, with tenderness
That mothers use; her mouth grows soft and sweet.
Then, lifting eyes, ye saints in heaven, what pain
In that strange look of hers into the rain!
With careless grace across her raven hair;
Her cheek burns brown; and ’t is her way to wear
A gown where colors stand in satin’s stead.
Her eye gleams dark as any you may see
Along the winding roads of Italy.
This beggar woman midst the draggled throng!
How must she pine for solaces of song,
For warmth and love to furnish laughing-times!
Her every glance upon the waters gray
Is piteous with some lost yesterday.
And once a flower growing stark alone
From out a rock; I ’ve heard a hound make moan,
Left masterless: but never came to me
Ere this such sense of creatures torn apart
From all that fondles life and feeds the heart.