Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Oceanica: Vol. XXXI. 1876–79.
The Shipwreck
By Alfred Domett (1811–1887)I
The port some few miles off in sight;
The pleasant sea’s subsiding swell
Of gales for days gone by may tell,
But on the bar no breaker white,
Only as yet a heavier roll
Denotes where lurks that dangerous shoal.
Alert with lead and chart and glass,
The pilot seeks the well-known pass;
All his familiar marks in view
Together brought, distinct and true.
Erelong the tide’s decreasing stream
Chafes at the nearer bank beneath;
The sea’s dark face begins to gleam
(Like tiger roused that shows his teeth)
With many a white foam-streak and seam:
Still should the passage, though more rough,
Have depth of water, width enough.
But why, though fair the wind and filled
The sails, though masts and cordage strain,
Why hangs, as by enchantment stilled,
The ship unmoving? All in vain
The helm is forced hard down; ’t is plain
The shoal has shifted, and the ship
Has touched, but o’er its tail, may slip:
She strains,—she moves,—a moment’s bound,
She makes ahead,—then strikes again
With greater force the harder ground.
She broaches to, her broadside black
Full in the breakers’ headlong track;
They leap like tigers on their prey;
She rolls as on they come amain,
Rolls heavily as in writhing pain.
The precious time flies fast away,—
The launch is swiftly manned and sent
Over the lee, with wild intent
To anchor grapplings where the tide
Runs smoother, and the ship might ride
Secure beyond the raging bar,
Could they but haul her off so far.
The boat against her bows is smashed;
Beneath the savage surges dashed,
Sucked under by the refluent wave,
They vanish, all those seamen brave.
On, on,—the breakers press,—no check,
No pause,—fly hissing o’er the wreck,
And scour along the dangerous deck.
The bulwarks on the seaward side,
Boats, rudder, stern-post iron-tied
With deep-driven bolts,—how vain a stay!
The weight of waters tears away.
Alas! and nothing can be done,—
No downward-hoisted flag, no gun
Be got at to give greater stress
To that unheard demand for aid
By the lost ship’s whole aspect made,—
Herself, in piteous helplessness,
One huge sad signal of distress.
Still on and on, the tide’s return
Redoubling now their rage and bulk,
In one fierce sweep from stem to stern
The thundering sheets of breakers roar,
High as the tops in spray-clouds soar,
And down in crashing cataracts pour
Over the rolling tortured hulk.
Death glares in every horrid shape,—
No help, no mercy, no escape!
For falling spars dash out the brains
Of some, and flying guns adrift,
Or splinters crush them,—slaughter swift
Whereof no slightest trace remains,
The furious foam no bloodshed stains:
Up to the yards and tops they go,—
No hope, no chance of life below!
Then as each ponderous groaning mast
Rocks loosened from its hold at last,
The shrouds and stays, now hanging slack,
Now jerking, bounding tensely back,
Fling off the helpless victims fast,
Like refuse on the yeast of death
That bellows, raves, and boils beneath.
One hapless wretch around his waist
A knotted rope has loosely braced;
When from the stay to which he clings
The jerking mast the doomed one flings,
It slips, and by the neck he swings:
Death grins and glares in hideous shape,—
No hope, no pity, no escape!
Still on and on, all day the same,
Through all that brilliant summer day
Beneath a sky so blithe and blue
The wild white whirl of waters flew,
In stunning volleys overswept
And beat the black ship’s yielding frame,
And all around roared, tossed, and leapt
Mad-wreathing swathes of snow! affray
More dire than most disastrous rout
Of some conceivable array
Of thronged white elephants,—as they
Their phalanx broke in warfare waged
In Siam or the Punjaub,—raged
And writhed their great white trunks about,
With screams that shrill as trumpets rung,
And drove destruction everywhere
In maddened terror at the shout
Of turbaned hosts and torches’ flare
Full in their monstrous faces flung;—
Wide horror! but to this, no less,
This furious lashing wilderness,
Innocuous-seeming, transient, tame!
Still on, still on, like fiends of Hell
Whiter than angels, frantic, fell,
Through all that summer day the same
The merciless murderous breakers came,
And to the mizzen-top that swayed
With every breach those breakers made,
Unaided, impotent to aid,
The mates and master clung all day.
There, while the sun onlooking gay
Triumphant trod his bright highway,—
There, till his cloudless rich decline,
Faint in the blinding deafening drench
Of salt waves roaring down the whine
And creaking groans each grinding wrench
Took from the tortured timbers,—there
All day, all day, in their despair,
The gently brave, the roughly good,
Collected, calm and silent stood.
That hideous doom they firmly face;
To no unmanly moans give way,
No frantic gestures; none disgrace
With wild bravado, vain display,
Their end, but like true men await
The dread extremity of fate.
Alas! and yet no tongue can tell
What thoughts of life and loved ones swell
With anguish irrepressible,
The hearts these horrors fail to quell.
The master urges them to prayer,
“No hope on earth, be heaven your care!”
And is it mockery—Oh, but mark
Those masts and crowding figures, dark
Against the flush of love and rest
Suffusing all the gorgeous west
In tearful golden glory drest,—
Such soft majestic tenderness,
As of a power that longs to bless
With ardors of divinest breath
All but one raging spot of death;
For all the wide expanse beside
Is blushing, beauteous as a bride,
And a fierce wedding-day indeed
It seems, of Life and Death, with none to heed.
The starting deck-planks; downward bowed
The mighty masts terrific lean;
Then each with its despairing crowd
Of life, with one tremendous roar
Falls like a tower,—and all is o’er.