The poem
QUINQUIREME of Nineveh from distant Ophir, Rowing home to haven in sunny Palestine, With a cargo of ivory, And apes and peacocks, Sandalwood, cedarwood, and sweet white wine.
Stately Spanish galleon coming from the Isthmus, Dipping through the Tropics by the palm-green shores, With a cargo of diamonds, Emeralds, amythysts, Topazes, and cinnamon, and gold moidores.
Dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke stack, Butting through the Channel in the mad March days, With a cargo of Tyne coal, Road-rails, pig-lead, Firewood, iron-ware, and cheap tin trays.
just clicked coz I saw nobody else had. I came in search of this poem as it is a favourite of my mum's and her older brother, who recently died and I wanted to make her feel better...
I had a teacher: Mr. Billimoria; who required that we memorize this poem in grade 7...a long time ago now, it seems, and yet I was encouraged by how well I was able to remember it! I remember how difficult it was to remember all of the names I hadn't heard before!
Old times
I had emailed my sister in England and remarked that I had been walking my dogs and felt the warm wind in my face and was reminded of "The West Wind". She wrote back and said she remembered "Cargoes". That set the memory whirring and I too remembered it as a song we sang in grade school some sixty five years ago. Funny how some things stick.