Sleep, sleep, Niagara, deep beneath the ice;
Your native thunder quell, that peace may reign
About your mammoth frame; let calm entice
Your weary waters, evermore a fane
For weary hearts to perch, spellbound in awe:
Carve caverns from the layered ice and snow,
That out the gap you breathe both rough and raw;
Along your sides let chilly north winds blow,
And cystallize the limbs of every tree
Guarding the lofty borders of your brim;
Let famished seagulls from your chill face flee,
That nothing stay the zealous eye to skim
Your placid whiteness, lost in rare displays
Of wonder, dreamy scenes for all to praise
Aerial view of the Niagara River Whirlpool and Rapids. Photograph by Andrew PorteusNiagara Falls, great cataract sublime,
Whose mists, like dragons, curl against the sky;
O thund’ring god, whose movement over time
Has gouged a mile-wide path, where seagulls fly
And trace your giant steps, each twist and turn,
Down yawning gorge to where the whirlpool boils
Beneath the dancing rapids — wild they churn,
Twisting, as round great rocks the river coils —
Why now the tears? The thousand voices sighing?
Do you not hear the reverent silence? Awe
And fear upon each frozen tongue? The dying
Exhalations of spirits, which, like straw
Before the winds, are strewn to airy silence?
You hear, you see, with pity not defiance.
Aerial view of Niagara Falls. Photo by Andrew Porteus
Through the ear the “Mighty Thunderer” makes
First assault upon the senses. A roar,
Like a thousand throbbing jungle drums, shakes
The earth, calling to see what lies in store.
Then through the eye, fearing to look away,
Lest it lose one moment of such splendour.
Then through the flesh, as on the face, cold spray
Mingles with tears which awe doth engender.
Indians, priests, explorers visioned naught
Of the miracles which were to flower,
As man with his struggling, probing mind sought
And found means to harness thy great power.
What riddles since first thy birth by glacier!
What riddles yet ere the last erasure!
Source: V.B. Rhodenizer (ed.) Canadian Poetry Magazine vol. 21, no. 1, Autumn 1957.
Welland Canal – Davis Culvert Construction, 1927. Photo courtesy of Niagara Falls Public Library(With apologies to Kipling’s “Ballad of Fultah Fisher’s Boarding House”)
As I sat upon the doorstep Of Bunkhouse Number Two Big Jim, the One lounged down ‘longside And cut him off a chew. This is the story he told me, As I tell it to you.
“Twas tougher then than now, me boy,”
Along this old canal;
But the Spirit of the Big Ditch
Held young and old in thrall.
The men often whined, “We Cannot,”
But the Spirit said, “Ye Shall.”
When they huddled in the shanties
After a twelve hour day
On the reeking piles of gumbo
(That cursed sticky clay).
They were nigh onto exhaustion,
Dyin’ to hit the hay.
But they’d sit around like we are,
And smoke a pipe or two,
And swap the most amazing yarns
Or curse the heavens blue.
They was a mongrel, jumbled lot
That Old Canal Crew.
There was Charlie Loo, the Chinee cook,
“The Senor” from Tampico,
The Greek which we called Louie,
Tall Hans from old Saro,
A guy from far-off Hebrides,
“Slow Sam” from Idaho.
There was Jake Tike, the scar-faced Red,
And his ugly leering sneer,
He was always stirring trouble
When the big Boss wasn’t near.
And there was Mike, the Irish lad,
With eyes still bright and clear.
Early this Morning by Betty Ann Whitney was First Place winner of the
Sunrise Tank II, contest, subject: Sunrise at Niagara Falls, Houston
Chapter of the Poetry Society of Texas’s Thirty-First annual Winter
Poetry Festival
Betty Ann Whitney is Sol Magazine’s Poetry Editor. Her poetry and prose has appeared in anthologies, magazines, journals and other creative publications for over a decade. She has won numerous awards for her poetry. She was Sol Magazine’s first Poet Laureate in 1998, and became assistant editor for Sol in 1999, contributing monthly articles for the glossary and Sol’s “WRITE-NOW” column.
Whitney is a member of the Poetry Society of Texas, New River Poets & Writers, Florida State Poets Association and National Federation of State Poetry Societies.
