Poetry Friday: Ferry Boats, Apples, Pears, Puget Sound etc.

 Ferry Boat on Puget Sound (taken by Wm. Doran)

Recuerdo
 
We were very tired, we were very merry­
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.
It was bare and bright, and smelled like a stable­
But we looked into a fire, we leaned across a table,
We lay on a hill-top underneath the moon;
And the whistles kept blowing, and the dawn came soon.

We were very tired, we were very merry­
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry;
And you ate an apple, and I ate a pear,
From a dozen of each we had bought somewhere;
And the sky went wan, and the wind came cold,
And the sun rose dripping, a bucketful of gold.

We were very tired, we were very merry,
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.
We hailed, "Good morrow, mother!" to a shawl-covered head,
And bought a morning paper, which neither of us read;
And she wept, "God bless you!" for the apples and pears,
And we gave her all our money but our subway fares.

                                                           - Edna St. Vincent Millay
                               

If I ever move away from Seattle, I'll have to move somewhere with ferry boats. How can people live without them? I suppose if you don't have them, don't ride them, don't see them slide slowly across the saltwater and into the dock, don't know how powerfully the motors rev underneath your feet as they pull out onto the water again, don't know what that cold air feels likes on your face when you're standing out on the bow, you wouldn't miss them. But I would. The poem above, by Edna St. Vincent Millay, opens so perfectly that I sometimes (like today) find the lines running through my mind for no reason whatsoever. And since Millay is undoubtedly talking about the Staten Island Ferry, I'll add in a photo of one of those beauties, sailing past the Statue of Liberty over and over without so much as sputtering, as if that lady were just a woman waiting for a bus. I love New York, and I love Seattle, and I love ferry boats.

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