The Plague Ship

The Plague Ship by Donald Wandrei
(after a pen-and-ink drawing by Howard Wandrei)

From the stricken hosts of those plague-filled coasts
We turned and set forth once more,
But we turned too late and we knew our fate
Before we had lost the shore.

For the plague germs fed on the sick and the dead
And the living walked less like men
Than shadows that crept with the sun, and slept
When the night came down again.

In the distance sank the coast in the dank
And stifling topic heat;
There could not be so still a sea
On which such sunfire beat.

The twilight brought no ease from the hot
Inferno, to the waves
That almost hissed or the shimmering mist
That hung on our deep sea-graves.

While sick men stoked, the black hulk poked
Her bow toward the cleaner west
Till the engines failed and we lay there gaoled
By the legions of the pest.

Then ocean received the husks that we heaved
From heat and plague as they died,
And one by one with the setting sun
The shadows slipped from our side.