The continent's a tamed ox, with all its mountains, <br />Powerful and servile; here is for plowland, here is <br /> for park and playground, this helpless <br />Cataract for power; it lies behind us at heel <br />All docile between this ocean and the other. If <br /> flood troubles the lowlands, or earthquake <br />Cracks walls, it is only a slave's blunder or the <br /> natural <br />Shudder of a new made slave. Therefore we happy <br /> masters about the solstice <br />Light bonfires on the shore and celebrate our power. <br />The bay's necklaced with fire, the bombs make crystal <br /> fountains in the air, the rockets <br />Shower swan's-neck over the night water.... I <br /> imagined <br />The stars drew apart a little as if from troublesome <br /> children, coldly compassionate; <br />But the ocean neither seemed astonished nor in awe: <br />If this had been the little sea that Xerxes whipped, <br /> how it would have feared us. <br /> <br /> <br />Submitted by Holt<br /><br />Robinson Jeffers<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/july-fourth-by-the-ocean/
