Great Poems by American Women by Susan L. Rattiner Read Free Book Online Page A

deep the mariner sees,
    And the surging heareth loud.
    Was that a face, looking up at him,
    With its pallid cheek and its cold eyes dim?
    Did it beckon him down? did it call his name?
    Now rolleth the ship the way whence it came.
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    The mariner looked, and he saw with dread
    A face he knew too well;
    And the cold eyes glared, the eyes of the dead,
    And its long hair out on the wave was spread.
    Was there a tale to tell?
    The stout ship rocked with a reeling speed,
    And the mariner groaned, as well he need;
    For, ever, down as she plunged on her side,
    The dead face gleamed from the briny tide.
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    Bethink thee, mariner, well, of the past,—
    A voice calls loud for thee:—
    There’s a stifled prayer, the first, the last;—
    The plunging ship on her beam is cast,—
    Oh, where shall thy burial be?
    Bethink thee of oaths that were lightly spoken,
    Bethink thee of vows that were lightly broken,
    Bethink thee of all that is dear to thee,
    For thou art alone on the raging sea:
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    Alone in the dark, alone on the wave,
    To buffet the storm alone,
    To struggle aghast at thy watery grave,
    To struggle and feel there is none to save,—
    God shield thee, helpless one!
    The stout limbs yield, for their strength is past,
    The trembling hands on the deep are cast,
    The white brow gleams a moment more,
    Then slowly sinks—the struggle is o’er.
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    Down, down where the storm is hushed to sleep,
    Where the sea its dirge shall swell,
    Where the amber drops for thee shall weep,
    And the rose-lipped shell her music keep,
    There thou shalt slumber well.
    The gem and the pearl lie heaped at thy side,
    They fell from the neck of the beautiful bride,
    From the strong man’s hand, from the maiden’s brow,
    As they slowly sunk to the wave below.
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    A peopled home is the ocean bed;
    The mother and child are there;
    The fervent youth and the hoary head,
    The maid, with her floating locks outspread,
    The babe with its silken hair;
    As the water moveth they lightly sway,
    And the tranquil lights on their features play;
    And there is each cherished and beautiful form,
    Away from decay, and away from the storm.

LUCRETIA DAVIDSON (1808—1825)
    Born in Plattsburg, New York, Lucretia Davidson was a precocious youth who learned the alphabet at the age of three. A sickly child, Davidson’s health began to worsen in 1823. She wrote her longest poem, “Amir Khan,” and a prose storv while visiting relatives in Canada. In 1824, Davidson attended Emma Hart Willard’s seminary in Troy, New York, and then went to a boarding school in Albany. Her life was short; she died one month shy of her seventeenth birthday and her poems and prose were published after her death. Lucretia’s younger sister, Margaret (1823-1838), was only two years old when her sister died. Margaret aspired to follow in Lucretia’s footsteps and wrote poems as well. Mirroring her older sister, Margaret, too, died in her teens, just before her sixteenth birthday.
    On the Birth of Her Sister Margaret
    Sweet babe, I cannot hope thou wilt be freed
From woes, to all, since earliest time, decreed;
But may’st thou be with resignation blessed,
To bear each evil, howsoe’er distressed.
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    May Hope her anchor lend amid the storm,
And o’er the tempest rear her angel form!
May sweet Benevolence, whose words are peace,
To the rude whirlwinds softly whisper, “Cease!”
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    And may Religion, Heaven’s own darling child,
Teach thee at human cares and griefs to smile;
Teach thee to look beyond this world of woe,
To Heaven’s high fount, whence mercies ever flow.
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    And when this vale of tears is safely passed—
When Death’s dark curtain shuts the scene at last—
May thy freed spirit leave this earthly sod,
And fly to seek the bosom of thy God.
    America
    And this was once the realm of Nature, where
Wild as the wind, though exquisitely fair,
She breathed the mountain breeze, or