High Tide at 4 A.M. - William McFee

They've tipped and they've shoveled, they've trimmed and they've stored,
And she's down to her load-line as ever;
The bridge is swung round and the pilot's aboard
And she's off to the dark o' the river.

Farewell to the grime and the dust of the tips,
It may be a month or for ever:
She's watched by the skeleton ghosts on the slips
As she ploughs through the dark o' the river.

She is one with the Mill and the Mine and the Mart;
Black coal is her cargo as ever:
You may sneer as you will, but she carries my heart
'Way down in the dark o' the river.

So I pray to the Lord in my bed here ashore
A fair weather passage to give her,
For there's shipmates aboard I may never see more
Till we've passed through the Dark o' the River!

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William McFee (1881 - 1966) England
From Songs of the Sea and Sailors' Chanteys, edited by Robert Frothingham,1924, p. 134 - poem is dated 1909

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Note by the poet in 1933:
"Here again we have a good homely sentiment which any human being except a modern poet will appreciate."