Tuesday - February 02, 2010

Letters From Littleton

Those sails that strained so full bent into the battle -
that broad bow that struck the surf aside, enlarging silently in steadfast haste, full front to the shot -
resistless and without reply -
those triple ports whose choirs of flame rang forth in their courses, into the fierce revenging monotone,
which, when it died away,
left no answering voice to rise any more upon the sea against the strength of England -
those sides that were wet with the long runlets of English life-blood,
like press-planks at vintage, gleaming goodly crimson down to the cast and clash of the washing foam -
those pale masts that stayed themselves up against the war-ruin, shaking out their ensigns through the thunder, till sail and ensign drooped -
steep in the death-stilled pause of Andalusian air,
burning with its witness-cloud of human souls at rest, -
surely, for these some sacred care might have been left in our thoughts -
some quiet space amidst the lapse of English waters?

Nay, not so.
We have stern keepers to trust her glory to - the fire and the worm.
Never more shall sunset lay golden robe on her, nor starlight tremble on the waves that part at her gliding.
Perhaps, where the low gate opens to some cottage-garden, the tired traveller may ask, idly, why the moss grows so green on its rugged wood;
and even the sailor’s child may not answer, nor know, that the night-dew lies deep in the war-rents of the wood of the old Téméraire.

a poet for an art critic
a look inside a lost world

Posted by Drew458     on 02/02/2010 at 02:04 PM   
Filed Under: • Art-Photography • Military • OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT • UK •  
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