| Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). Poetry: A Magazine of Verse. 1912–22. | | | | Dirge for a Dead Admiral | | By Samuel McCoy |
| | | WHAT woman but would be | |
| Rid of thy mastery, | |
| Thou bully of the sea? | |
| |
| No more the gray sea’s breast | |
| Need answer thy behest; | 5 |
| No more thy sullen gun | |
| Shall greet the risen sun, | |
| Where the great dreadnaughts ride | |
| The breast of thy cold bride; | |
| Thou hast fulfilled thy fate: | 10 |
| Need trade no more with hate! | |
| |
| Nay, but I celebrate | |
| Thy long-to-be-lorn mate, | |
| Thy mistress and her state, | |
| Thy lady sea’s lorn state. | 15 |
| She hath her empery | |
| Not only over thee | |
| But o’er our misery. | |
| |
| Hark, doth she mourn for thee? | |
| |
| Nay, what hath she of grief? | 20 |
| She knoweth not the leaf | |
| That on her bosom falls, | |
| Thou last of admirals! | |
| Under the winter moon | |
| She singeth that fierce tune, | 25 |
| Her immemorial rune; | |
| Knoweth not, late or soon, | |
| Careth not | |
| Any jot | |
| For her withholden boon | 30 |
| To all thy spirit’s pleas | |
| For infinite surcease! | |
| |
| If, on this winter night, | |
| O thou great admiral | |
| That in thy sombre pall | 35 |
| Liest upon the land, | |
| Thy soul should take his flight | |
| And leave the frozen sand, | |
| And yearn above the surge, | |
| Think’st thou that any dirge, | 40 |
| Grief inarticulate | |
| From thy bereaved mate, | |
| Would answer to thy soul | |
| Where the waste waters roll? | |
| |
| Nay, thou hast need of none! | 45 |
| Thy long love-watch is done! | | | | |
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