Close in the shadow of a warehouse lay The blockade-runner with her smokestacks gray, Back-raking like her masts, and up her hatches Came voices, and the furnace-light in patches Beat on the sails, and there alone was life-- The stevedores sang muffled snatches, and a strife Of bales and barrels streamed down her yawning hold; Cotton more valuable than money, And barrels of the St. Louis sorghum and molasses, Honey to lure the bees of English gold. Three days she lay, this arrow-pointed boat, With a light gold necklace, beaded at her throat, Something there was about her like a stoat That lies in wait to make a silent rush, And there was something in her like a thrush, For she had paddle-wheels, each like a wing. She had a long hornet stern that seemed to hold a sting. Sometimes her paddles slowly turned, For they kept steam up, waiting for a gale. It seemed as if the slim boat chafed and yearned To go hell-tearing under steam and sail. The oily water churned And made a _slap-slap_ to the paddles' stroke; And a high painted canvas screen cut off The blue haze of the lightwood smoke. On the third evening, just at sunset, came A scud of driving cloud; the lightning's flame; The sun glared from a vicious, misty socket, And in the moaning twilight curved a rocket While a blue flame blurred and frayed At Castle Pinckney; thus we knew the storm Had shifted the blockade. IV Out from the docks we shot Into the screaming night; We steered by lightning's light; The paddles beat a mad tattoo; The gridded walking-beam Pumped up, pumped down, Against the misty gleam; Faster and faster jets the stand-pipes' steam. And the white water whirls Astern in phosphorescent whorls-- It swirls And then leads backward green with light Of streaming foam across the velvet night. By the last lightning flare, That must be Sumter, bare Against a torn cloud like a rag; But now the wind begins to flag, And as it fails the engines lag; Then comes a low hail from the mast "Avast"-- Again the engines slow-- Then stop-- And we were drifting like a log As silent as a drowned corpse In the sea-set tide, Muffled in dripping fog. No word from all the ship-- She seemed asleep-- Only the cluck of water and the feel Of grim Atlantic rollers at the keel, Nuzzling two fathoms deep; They made her heel. The porpoise played about our copper lip. It seemed as if they were The only living things in all that blur, And we-- The only ship upon an ancient sea.