THE RIVER FLOWS
By JOHN GOULD FLETCHER
EMERGING with the daybreak,
Drifting in silence down a sluggish river,
Between two banks dividing
Which held the summer between them firm forever,
I saw the cottonwoods
Receding southwards,
The arms of the cypress
Touch the horizon,
The great white pelicans
Far away, beating and fluttering their outstretched wings.
Drifting in silence down a sluggish river,
Between two banks dividing
Which held the summer between them firm forever,
I saw the cottonwoods
Receding southwards,
The arms of the cypress
Touch the horizon,
The great white pelicans
Far away, beating and fluttering their outstretched wings.
At Cairo, the ranks of the corn stood up like a plumed immortal army,
We drifted on in a sunset of rosy heat.
There was a flatboat hanging alongside laden with green melons,
A passion-flower vine upon a whitewashed wall.
We drifted on in a sunset of rosy heat.
There was a flatboat hanging alongside laden with green melons,
A passion-flower vine upon a whitewashed wall.
At St. Louis we waited all morning with the roar of the trucks cutting across the cobbles,
The river swirling through the great arches of the bridge above us,
The mules flicking their ears against the flies.
The river swirling through the great arches of the bridge above us,
The mules flicking their ears against the flies.
Vicksburg of yellow bluffs, Natchez of tumbling houses—
The low banks we felt for in the darkness.
The low banks we felt for in the darkness.
At New Orleans we tied to the levee in the quiet of early morning,
We wakened to see the city washed clean by colorless daylight;
City once seen in midwinter glory, now drowsing in torrid silence.
We wakened to see the city washed clean by colorless daylight;
City once seen in midwinter glory, now drowsing in torrid silence.
Faint scent of patchouli hung above it,
Of flowered silk and waxwhite prayers.
Of flowered silk and waxwhite prayers.
And the river took me—
The river which flowed through my dreams and which goes on still through my heart,
The masculine yellow Mississippi that the railroads had made forgotten,
The river of Spanish explorers, of canebrakes and floods, the pathway of strife that cut through the heart of my south.
The river which flowed through my dreams and which goes on still through my heart,
The masculine yellow Mississippi that the railroads had made forgotten,
The river of Spanish explorers, of canebrakes and floods, the pathway of strife that cut through the heart of my south.
I saw it once—I see it now forever.
For, with the next spring,
It was time to go.
Back to gray Europe
Shivering under the dark cloud that hung greedily poised above it.
For, with the next spring,
It was time to go.
Back to gray Europe
Shivering under the dark cloud that hung greedily poised above it.
Manhattan, opulent and daring, faded—
The broad-shaded southern town that I loved went out of existence—
The deep jade of the redwoods about San Francisco, the glowing fire of their trunks, disappeared from life,
The stony hillsides of New England, their sparse white farmhouses, followed—
The hard gray streets of Chicago running relentlessly forward into the wild blue lake,
These could not keep me back.
The broad-shaded southern town that I loved went out of existence—
The deep jade of the redwoods about San Francisco, the glowing fire of their trunks, disappeared from life,
The stony hillsides of New England, their sparse white farmhouses, followed—
The hard gray streets of Chicago running relentlessly forward into the wild blue lake,
These could not keep me back.
There dropped on them all the calm of a green-wooded harbour,
Terraced streets and belfry by the shore,
Skeleton clippers standing at attention
Amid a world at war.
Terraced streets and belfry by the shore,
Skeleton clippers standing at attention
Amid a world at war.