Category: Niagara Poet

A Country Sleigh Ride by Melvin Byron Misener (A Fragment)

sleigh
George Ellis, Wife and Girl at Dufferin Islands, Niagara Falls, 1890
Image courtesy of Niagara Falls Public Library

Last Thursday night with the weather mild,
A party proposed a sleigh-ride wild,
So they all piled into a two-horse sleigh
And sped to the country miles away.

To say where they went I think’s no harm,
For they landed at the Robertson farm ;
We think their number was forty-five.
Were they noisy ? Well, they were much alive.

Now they took Dr. Wallis, he’s quite a nob,
And always on hand for a tying job.
He went just to help the youngsters through—
A helper good where there’s work to do.

The telephone’s handy, bet your life,
So Wallis telephones to his wife :
“We got here safe, twenty minutes to stay,
And then we take our homeward way.”

It was not so, for the whole bunch
Say we don’t leave till we have our lunch.
So coffee, cake and a sandwich too,
Were passed around among the few.

On Fluvius now you can’t depend,
When you want it dry, the rain he’ll send ;
So, to make them mind their homeward trip,
The rain came down with a drip, drip, drip.

[page is cut off at this point]

Source: Probably from The Welland Tribune. Found in the Misener folder of the Mayholme Foundation

Melvin Byron Misener of Crowland (May 18, 1847 – May 28, 1936), was known by many readers of the Welland Tribune as “the Crowland Poet”. His personal writings span the period from 1869 to 1935. Among the daily accounts of social events, weather conditions and farm chores in his diaries there are numerous obituaries for friends, family and others living in Welland County, particularly Crowland, Thorold and Port Robinson.

Read more about Misener

Twilight on the Tow-Path by Ernest Green

green
Delaware and Lehigh rivers at Easton Pa.
by Augustus Kollner, 1844
Image courtesy of the Library of Congress
Barge being towed by horses in foreground

I’m a-sitting by the tow-path
‡‡Of the days of long ago,
Where the long, green grass is growing
‡‡And the ox-eye daisies blow,
And I see a fading vision,
‡‡‘Gainst the sun’s last westward glow,
Of the schooners and the horses
‡‡In the days I used to know.

Big-boned horses, drooping, weary,
‡‡As they drew the tow-line taut;
Idle sailors, singing, cheery,
‡‡Lounging where the decks are hot;
Trudging tow-boys, cracking whips,
‡‡Cursing when a tow-horse slips;
And the rattling rustling, creaking
‡‡Of the gear upon the ships.

Little schooners with their lumber,
‡‡Going down the narrow ditch,
Out of Michigan and Huron
‡‡Bringing ashes, staves and pitch;
All the forests of the inland
‡‡Floating seaward, hour by hour,
Making way for farms and millers
‡‡To send down their wheat and flour.

And the immigrants go upward,
‡‡Irish, Scot, and Norse and Swede,
Looking to the land of promise
‡‡Where hard work is all they need
For the carving of a future
‡‡And the foundation of a race,
Facing westward, keen and eager,
‡‡To their new, free dwelling-place.

But the sailing ships have vanished,
‡‡And the tow-path sod is green,
Gone are horses, whips and shoutings,
‡‡Giving place to steel and steam,
Rusty plates and smoke and smother,
‡‡Sixteen hatchways in a row,
And a welkin-splitting clamor
‡‡That pursues me as I go.

I have seen as rare a vision
‡‡As the ancient prophets saw,
I have seen mankind in action
‡‡Working out the ancient law,—
“You shall all this earth replenish
‡‡“And subdue its every sod,”—
‘Tis mankind that builds our nation
‡‡But the architect, is God.

Source: McCabe, Kevin (ed.) The Poetry of Old Niagara. St. Catharines: Blarney Stone Books, 1999.

Originally published in the St. Catharines Standard, November 29, 1924

Read about Ernest Green

To Avoid an Unpleasant Tryst by Christopher Ellis

ellis
Niagara Falls from the Maid of the Mist Boat, 2022
Photo by Andrew Porteus

A young girl who’d never been kissed
To avoid an unpleasant tryst
She paddled her skiff
O’er the watery cliff
Becoming the Maid of the Mist

Source: Laroque, Corey. Here’s What the Poets are Saying. Niagara Falls, Ont.: Niagara Falls Review, November 21, 2009

This limerick was entered into the So You Think You Can Rhyme (2009) Limerick Contest to find Niagara Falls’ Poet Laureate

Go to the Limericks page

Parked at the Mall by Heather Price

price
Heather Price
Photo by Mike DiBattista, 2009

Daredevils have been at the Falls
1812 brought us cannon balls
Laura Secord was dear
Warned British the U.S. was near
Now we fight to get parked at the mall

Source: Laroque, Corey. Here’s What the Poets are Saying. Niagara Falls, Ont.: Niagara Falls Review, November 21, 2009

This limerick won 1st place in the So You Think You Can Rhyme (2009) Limerick Contest to find Niagara Falls’ Poet Laureate

Read about Heather Price

Go to the Limericks page

To the House of My Friend by Erieus

house
The House Where Brock’s Body Was Carried To And Hidden During The Battle
by Ian Graham, 1977
Image courtesy of Niagara Falls Public Library
This house would have been standing in 1826 when Erieus wrote this poem.

House of my Friend! — may no dishonoring stain
Pollute thy sacred walls: — may virtue bright
The blest direction of her course maintain,
And guide thy inmates in the ways of right:
May no intruding demon ever blight
Their mutual harmony, and love, and peace;
But meek Religion’s pure, celestial light
Shine in each heart, — there grow, and never cease,
Till Heaven itself shall be the measure of increase.

Written at Niagara, August 1826

Adam Hood Burwell published poems under the pen name Erieus, the “Pioneer Poet of Upper Canada.”

Source: MacDonald, Mary Lu. “New” Poems of Adam Hood Burwell. canadianpoetry.org/volumes/vol18/macdonald.html, 5/12/2020. Originally published in The U.E. Loyalist, October 28, 1826