| Edwin Arlington Robinson (1869–1935). Collected Poems. 1921. |
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| VII. The Three Taverns |
| 8. The Flying Dutchman |
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| UNYIELDING in the pride of his defiance, | |
| Afloat with none to serve or to command, | |
| Lord of himself at last, and all by Science, | |
| He seeks the Vanished Land. | |
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| Alone, by the one light of his one thought, | 5 |
| He steers to find the shore from which we came, | |
| Fearless of in what coil he may be caught | |
| On seas that have no name. | |
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| Into the night he sails; and after night | |
| There is a dawning, though there be no sun; | 10 |
| Wherefore, with nothing but himself in sight, | |
| Unsighted, he sails on. | |
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| At last there is a lifting of the cloud | |
| Between the flood before him and the sky; | |
| And then—though he may curse the Power aloud | 15 |
| That has no power to die— | |
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| He steers himself away from what is haunted | |
| By the old ghost of what has been before,— | |
| Abandoning, as always, and undaunted, | |
| One fog-walled island more. | 20 |
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