Page:Main Street and other poems, Kilmer, 1917.djvu/81

This page has been validated.


MAIN STREET AND OTHER POEMS


THE WHITE SHIPS AND THE RED (continued)

White as the ice that clove her
That unforgotten day,
Among her pallid sisters
The grim Titanic lay.
And through the leagues above her
She looked aghast, and said:
"What is this living ship that comes
Where every ship is dead?"


The ghostly vessels trembled
From ruined stern to prow;
What was this thing of terror
That broke their vigil now?
Down through the startled ocean
A mighty vessel came,
Not white, as all dead ships must be,
But red, like living flame!


The pale green waves about her
Were swiftly, strangely dyed,
By the great scarlet stream that flowed

From out her wounded side.

[ 75 ]