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James Russell Lowell - The Flying Dutchman
Work rating: Low

Don`t believe in the Flying Dutchman?
  I`ve known the fellow for years;
My button I`ve wrenched from his clutch, man:
  I shudder whenever he nears!

He`s a Rip van Winkle skipper,
  A Wandering Jew of the sea,
Who sails his bedevilled old clipper
  In the wind`s eye, straight as a bee.

Back topsails! you can`t escape him;
  The man-ropes stretch with his weight,
And the queerest old toggeries drape him,
  The Lord knows how long out of date!

Like a long-disembodied idea,
  (A kind of ghost plentiful now,)
He stands there; you fancy you see a
  Coeval of Teniers or Douw.

He greets you; would have you take letters:
  You scan the addresses with dread,
While he mutters his _donners_ and _wetters_,--
  They`re all from the dead to the dead!

You seem taking time for reflection,
  But the heart fills your throat with a jam,
As you spell in each faded direction
  An ominous ending in _dam_.

Am I tagging my rhymes to a legend?
  That were changing green turtle to mock:
No, thank you! I`ve found out which wedge-end
  Is meant for the head of a block.

The fellow I have in my mind`s eye
  Plays the old Skipper`s part here on shore,
And sticks like a burr, till he finds I
  Have got just the gauge of his bore.

This postman `twist one ghost and t`other,
  With last dates that smell of the mould,
I have met him (O man and brother,
  Forgive me!) in azure and gold.

In the pulpit I`ve known of his preaching,
  Out of hearing behind the time,
Some statement of Balaam`s impeaching,
  Giving Eve a due sense of her crime.

I have seen him some poor ancient thrashing
  Into something (God save us!) more dry,
With the Water of Life itself washing
  The life out of earth, sea, and sky.

O dread fellow-mortal, get newer
  Despatches to carry, or none!
We`re as quick as the Greek and the Jew were
  At knowing a loaf from a stone.

Till the couriers of God fail in duty,
  We sha`n`t ask a mummy for news,
Nor sate the soul`s hunger for beauty
  With your drawings from casts of a Muse.
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