Listen my masters! I speak naught but truth. <br />From dawn to dawn they drifted on and on, <br />Not knowing wither nor to what dark end. <br />Now the North froze them, now the hot South scorched. <br />Some called to God, and found great comfort so; <br />Some gnashed their teeth with curses, some laughed <br />An empty laughter, seeing they yet lived, <br />So sweet was breath between their foolish lips. <br />Day after day the same relentless sun, <br />Night after night the same unpitying stars. <br />At intervals fierce lightning tore the clouds, <br />Showing vast hollow spaces, and the sleet <br />Hissed, and the torrents of the sky were loosed. <br />From time to time a hand relaxed its grip, <br />And some pale wretch slid down into the dark <br />With stifled moan, and transient horror seized <br />The rest who waited, knowing what must be. <br />At every turn strange shapes reached up and clutched <br />The whirling wreck, held on awhile, and then <br />Slipt back into that blackness whence they came. <br />Ah, hapless folk, to be so tost and torn, <br />So racked by hunger, fever, fire, and wave, <br />And swept at last into the nameless void-- <br />Frail girls, strong men, and mothers with their babes! <br /> <br />And was none saved? <br />My masters, not a soul! <br /> <br />O shipman, woful, woful is thy tale! <br />Our hearts are heavy and our eyes are dimmed. <br />What ship is this that suffered such ill fate? <br /> <br />What ship, my masters? Know ye not?--The World!<br /><br />Thomas Bailey Aldrich<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-shipman-s-tale/
