Lyr. Add: FIDDLER'S GREEN (Roberts)
Theodore Goodridge Roberts

""At a place called Fiddler's Green, there do all honest Mariners take their pleasure after death; and there are Admirals with their dear Ladies and Captains of lost voyages with the sweethearts of their youth, and tarry-handed Sailormen singing in cottage gardens.""

Never again shall we beat out to sea
In rain and mist and sleet like bitter tears,
And watch the harbour beacons fade, alee,
And people all the sea-room with our fears.
Our toil is done. No more, no more do we
Square the low yards and stagger on the sea.

No more for us the white and windless day,
Undimmed, unshadowed, where the weed drifts by,
And leaden fish pass, rolling, at their play,
And changeless suns slide up a changeless sky.
Our watch is done; and never more shall we
Whistle the wind across an empty sea.

Cities we saw- white walled and glinting dome-
And palm-fringed islands dreaming on the blue,
To us more fair the kindly sights of home-
The climbing street, the windows shining true.
Our voyage is done: And never more shall we
Reef the harsh topsails on a tossing sea.

Wonders we knew and beauty in far ports;
Laughter and peril 'round the swinging deep;
The wrath of God; the pomp of painted courts. . .
The rocks sprang black!- And we awoke from sleep.
Our task is done, and never more shall we
square the low yards and stagger on the sea.

Here are the hearts we love,the lips we know,
The hands of seafarers who came before.
The eyes that wept for me a night ago
Are laughing now that we shall part no more.
All grief is done; and never more shall we
Make sail at dawning for the luring sea.

Pp. 201-202; Bliss Carman and Lorne Pierce, chosen by, 1922 (1935 rev.), "Our Canadian Literature, Representative Verse, English and French," The Ryerson Press, Toronto.