Descending the swift, imperturbable flood,
I could no longer feel the pilot’s reins;
Exultant redskins had shed his blood,
Nailed his naked limbs to a brilliant stake.

I cared nothing for the fate of my crew,
Minds filled with English lace and Flemish wheat.
When all that din had been tomahawked too
The rivers let me travel as I pleased.

Into the frenzy of the tides, last winter,
As gravely intent as a playing boy,
I sped! The unmoored, errant peninsulas
Had never seen such tumultuous joy!

Tempests anointed my wakening head.
I danced on the waves, as light as a cork
(The waves, singers say, that cradle the dead)
With no tears for the witless gleam of port.
...