Lowry, Malcolm: At the Bar
At the Bar (English)– Drunkards of salt water, thirsty for disaster, Derelicts do not dream of being ships: Never does calamity forsake them For the hush of the swift and the look-out’s all’s well: Neurotic in Atlantic of a death, Bereaved but avid of another’s breath, Swimming with black genius under black waters, And buried standing up like Ben Jonson, Though eighteenpence is here total loss; And Tarquin certain of ravishable prey; While others grope the rails, rigid with gazing down.
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