The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #99170   Message #1981893
Posted By: Charley Noble
28-Feb-07 - 11:55 AM
Thread Name: Old Sailor-Poets (early 1900's)
Subject: LYR.ADD.: A Seaman's Confession Of Faith
Here's a spiritual poem by Harry Kemp:

From CHANTEYS AND BALLADS, by Harry Kemp, published by Brentano's, New York, US, © 1920, p. 15.

A Seaman's Confession Of Faith

As long as I go forth on ships that sail
The mighty seas, my faith, O Lord, won't fail;
And while the stars march onward mightily
In white, great hosts, I shall remember Thee;
I have seen men one moment all alive,
The next, gone out with none to bless or shrive
Into the unseen place where all must go, --
So, Lord, thy mercy and thy gifts I know . . .
They think me Godless, maybe, but indeed
They do not see how I have read thy creed
In flowing tides and waves that heave and run
Beyond the endless west where sinks the sun;
In the long, long night-watches I have thought
On things that neither can be sold nor bought,
Rare, priceless things; nor have I scorned nor scoffed
At thy sure might, when lost in storms aloft:
The prayer and faith of seamen will not fail
O God, my God, as long as ships do sail.

Cheerily,
Charles Noble