When the Great Ark, in Vigo Bay,
Rode stately through the half-manned fleet,
From every ship about her way
She heard the mariners entreat–
Before we take the seas again
Let down your boats and send us men!
“We have no lack of victual here
With work–God knows!–enough for all,
To hand and reef and watch and steer,
Because our present strength is small.
While your three decks are crowded so
Your crews can scarcely stand or go.
“In war, your numbers do but raise
Confusion and divided will;
In storm, the mindless deep obeys
Not multitudes but single skills.
In calm, your numbers, closely pressed,
Must breed a mutiny or pest.
“We even on unchallenged seas,
Dare not adventure where we would,
But forfeit brave advantages
For lack of men to make ’em good;
Whereby, to England’s double cost,
Honour and profit both are lost!”
—————
The End
And that’s the End of the Poem
© Poetry Monster, 2021.
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Poetry Monster — the multilingual library of poetic works. Here you’ll find original poems, poetry translations, ancient verses, ballads and even folk tales.
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Some external links: The Bat’s Poetry Cave. — Fledermaus’s poetry site. Talking Writing Monster. — the irreverent and irrelevant chatter on subjects both serious and not quite. A free for all board. You can scribble anything on it without registration (but it doesn’t let spammers in). You can even post your poems. Qwant.com. — a search engine from France. It’s an alternative because there are a few alternatives, like Bing, Duckduckgo, and Ecosia. And there is Yandex, the ultimate language-oriented search engine for the Russophone world. Commercial Links: Russian Commerce – the foreign trade assistance agency Other links: Poems and poetry in Russian (if you are reading this in English, as you obviously are, then you’d have to switch the language, the language switch is on the menu. More on languages)
