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1819–1892

The Pilot in the Mist

Walt Whitman

Steaming the northern rapids — ( an old St. Lawrence reminiscence, A sudden memory-flash comes back, I know not why, Here waiting for the sunrise, gazing from this hill;) Again‘ tis just at morning — a heavy haze contends with daybreak,

Again the trembling, laboring vessel veers me — I press through foam-dash'd rocks that almost touch me, Again I mark where aft the small thin Indian helmsman Looms in the mist, with brow elate and governing hand.

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The Pilot in the Mist · Walt Whitman · Poetry Cove