Poem: “The Temeraire” by Herman Melville

Poems From Battle Pieces

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American Literature – American Poetry – Herman Melville – Poems by Herman Melville – Poems From Battle Pieces
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The Temeraire [1]

Supposed to have been suggested to an Englishman of the old order by the fight of the Monitor and Merrimac

The gloomy hulls in armor grim,
    Like clouds o’er moors have met,
And prove that oak, and iron, and man
    Are tough in fibre yet.

But Splendors wane. The sea-fight yields
    No front of old display;
The garniture, emblazonment,
    And heraldry all decay.

Towering afar in parting light,
    The fleets like Albion’s forelands shine—
The full-sailed fleets, the shrouded show
    Of Ships-of-the-Line.

    The fighting Temeraire,
        Built of a thousand trees,
    Lunging out her lightnings,
        And beetling o’er the seas—
    O Ship, how brave and fair,
        That fought so oft and well,

On open decks you manned the gun Armorial.
What cheerings did you share,
    Impulsive in the van,
When down upon leagued France and Spain
    We English ran—
The freshet at your bowsprit
    Like the foam upon the can.
Bickering, your colors
    Licked up the Spanish air,
You flapped with flames of battle-flags—
    Your challenge, Temeraire!
The rear ones of our fleet
    They yearned to share your place,
Still vying with the Victory
Throughout that earnest race—
The Victory, whose Admiral,
    With orders nobly won,
Shone in the globe of the battle glow—
    The angel in that sun.
Parallel in story,
    Lo, the stately pair,
As late in grapple ranging,
    The foe between them there—
When four great hulls lay tiered,
And the fiery tempest cleared,
And your prizes twain appeared, Temeraire!

But Trafalgar is over now,
    The quarter-deck undone;
The carved and castled navies fire
    Their evening-gun.
O, Titan Temeraire,
    Your stern-lights fade away;
Your bulwarks to the years must yield,
    And heart-of-oak decay.
A pigmy steam-tug tows you,
    Gigantic, to the shore—
Dismantled of your guns and spars,
    And sweeping wings of war.
The rivets clinch the iron clads,
    Men learn a deadlier lore;
But Fame has nailed your battle-flags—
    Your ghost it sails before:
O, the navies old and oaken,
    O, the Temeraire no more!

1 The Temeraire, that storied ship of the old English fleet, and the subject of the well-known painting by Turner, commends itself to the mind seeking for some one craft to stand for the poetic ideal of those great historic wooden warships, whose gradual displacement is lamented by none more than by regularly educated navy officers, and of all nations.

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A Utilitarian View Of The monitor’s fight > > >

American Literature – American Poetry – Herman Melville – Poems by Herman Melville – Poems From Battle Pieces

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Poems From Battle Pieces

The Temeraire [1]

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