Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE VOICE OF FRANCIS DRAKE (FROM NOMBRE DE DIOS BAY, 1919), by ETHELEAN TYSON GAW


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE VOICE OF FRANCIS DRAKE (FROM NOMBRE DE DIOS BAY, 1919), by                    
First Line: Oh england, mother england, the blue waves
Last Line: Down to death and victory.
Subject(s): Drake, Sir Francis (1540-1596); England; English


Oh England, mother England, the blue waves cover me
Where rainbow fires are flashing on crests of silver foam,
And strange flowers fling their cloying sweets over a tropic sea,
And tall palms sway on coral reefs a thousand leagues from home.
Oh England, England, England,
I set your empire's bound
When, my shadowy sails acrowding,
Through the star-strewn billows plunging,
I sailed the world around.

Oh England, mother England, I faced the might of Spain --
In their shrouds of writhing sea-mist the huge black galleons hung;
But the God of storms fought for us and we beat them back again
And the scepter of the waters from the lordly Phillip wrung.

Oh England, England, England,
Hold fast the gift I won,
When, the wild gray waters ploughing,
To an unknown splendor hasting,
I outstripped the setting sun.

Oh England, mother England, the foe is at your door,
And I cannot lie asleeping in this sun-drenched foreign grave.
I hear your navies thunder and the North Sea billows roar,
Shattering the twilight silence where the deep-sea grasses wave.
Oh England, England, England,
I see your white cliffs stand
With the grey fogs round them wreathing,
Though three hundred years I'm sleeping
In this painted sunset land.

Oh England, mother England, I rise to meet your foe,
And my Devon lads come thronging from a thousand English
graves.
As we launch our ghostly galleon in the stormy sunset glow,
Clear we send our challenge ringing o'er the wild exultant waves.
Oh England, England, England,
We break death's leaden thrall;
From flower-sweet turf awakening,
Or from ocean caverns rising,
We are answering your call;

For the scales of fate are wavering as the cannon thunders roar,
And the lightnings flash and quiver where the battle billows swell,
While the waves of living valor break on death's eternal shore
And men's souls, undaunted, grapple with the unchained powers of hell;
So England, England, England,
As of old my place must be
With the sons of Britain, battling
Through the jaws of hell and crashing
Down to death and victory.





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