From Joseph Danko 11-04-98
I wanted to post a poem on the WJ BBS, but felt
it was inappropriate at the time. I'll
share it with you. I felt the last sentence might offend people
at that early time.
The Ship
I am standing upon the seashore.
A ship at my side spreads her white
sails to the morning breeze and starts for the blue ocean.
She is an object of beauty and strength, and I stand and watch
her until
at length she is only a speck of white cloud just where the sea
and sky meet
and mingle with each other. then someone at my side exclaims,
"There, she's
gone!"
Gone where? Gone from my sight, that is all. She is just as large
in
hull and mast and spar as she was when she left my side, and just
as able to
bear her load of living freight to the place of her destination.
Her
diminished size is in me, not in her.
And just at the moment when someone at my side says, "She's
gone," there
are other eyes watching for her coming and other voices ready
to take up the
glad shout, "There, she comes!"
And that is dying.
Author unknown - taken from
the book "Poems that live forever"
.