Classic and Contemporary Poetry
THE TOTE TEAM, by ARCHIE WILFRED STONE First Line: Over the bridge / with heavy tread Last Line: A black and a white and a blood-red bay. Subject(s): Animals; Horses; Labor & Laborers; Work; Workers | ||||||||
Over the Bridge With heavy tread Tramp, tramp, tramp With heave of shoulder, And toss of head Tramp, tramp, tramp With crack of harness, And a rumble of wheels, And a drumming thunder of iron heels; Jim and Colonel, and blaze-faced Bill, Dinah and Molly, and star-faced Jill; A sorrel, a roan and a dappled gray, A black and a white and a blood-red bay. Over the bridge, And up the road, And into the woods with the swaying load Tramp, tramp, tramp For men must work, And men must eat, And horses must sweat on steel-shod feet Tramp, tramp, tramp There are forty men at Number Ten, And forty more at York's; There's a camp on the Moose, And a crew at the Sluice, And a hungry gang at the Forks. So over the bridge, And up the road, And into the woods with the swaying load Tramp, tramp, tramp Flour and beef and salted fish, A sack of peas for a Frenchman's dish, Pork and beans, and a pickled ham, Coffee and sugar, and raspberry jam; Tobacco and matches, and corn-cob pipes, Woolen blankets and scarlet stripes, Socks and mittens and mackinaws gay, Grain for the horses, and bales of hay. So over the bridge, And up the road, And into the woods with the swaying load Tramp, tramp, tramp Straddling a rock, Grazing a stump, Crossing the corduroy, Thumpety-bump. Then hock and hub In the deep black mud, While the hot flanks reek with a steaming flood. The brown fawn wonders to see them pass; The bob-cat grins from her nest in the grass; The white-tail snorts and bounds away So tramp, tramp, tramp, Through the weary day. For men must work, And men must eat, And horses must sweat on steel-shod feet. Jim and Colonel, and blaze-faced Bill, Molly and Dinah, and star-faced Jill; A sorrel, a roan and a dapple gray, A black and a white and a blood-red bay. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...AFTER WORKING SIXTY HOURS AGAIN FOR WHAT REASON by HICOK. BOB DAY JOB AND NIGHT JOB by ANDREW HUDGINS BIXBY'S LANDING by ROBINSON JEFFERS ON BUILDING WITH STONE by ROBINSON JEFFERS LINES FROM A PLUTOCRATIC POETASTER TO A DITCH-DIGGER by FRANKLIN PIERCE ADAMS IN CALIFORNIA: MORNING, EVENING, LATE JANUARY by DENISE LEVERTOV FOR ST. BARTHOLOMEW'S EVE by MALCOLM COWLEY |
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