To people who allege that we <br />Incline to overrate the Sea <br />I answer, 'We do not; <br />Apart from being colored blue, <br />It has its uses not a few; <br />I cannot think what we should do <br />If ever 'the deep did rot.'' <br /> <br />Take ships, for instance. You will note <br />That, lacking stuff on which to float, <br />They could not get about; <br />Dreadnought and liner, smack and yawl, <br />And other types that you'll recall- <br />They simply could not sail at all <br />If Ocean once gave out. <br /> <br />And see the trouble which it saves <br />To islands; but for all those waves <br />That made us what we are- <br />But for their help so kindly lent, <br />Europe could march right through to Kent <br />And never need to circumvent <br />A single British tar. <br /> <br />Take fish, again. I have in mind <br />No better field that they could find <br />For exercise or sport; <br />How would the whale, I want to know, <br />The blubbery whale contrive to blow? <br />Where would your playful kipper go <br />If the supply ran short? <br /> <br />And hence we rank the Ocean high; <br />But there are privy reasons why <br />Its praise is on my lip: <br />I deem it, when my heart is set <br />On walking into something wet, <br />The nicest medium I have met <br />In which to take a dip.<br /><br />Sir Owen Seaman<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-uses-of-ocean/
