The Passage

Each from a distant wharf or pier,

now a bark on unfamiliar waters,

daring all those swells and crests,

maelstroms and gales and wrecks..
the ebbs that pass shift the wheel,

yet stars at night return the veer;

the calm the light brings ends in hale,

the wind that billows the tattered sails,

that shakes the mast stern-to-bow,

daunt not steadfast eyes on the prow,

embolden these hands of any fall

till glimpse of the final port of call.