Posted on 02/27/2008 12:21:19 PM PST by Clive
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
Now Sam McGee was from Tennessee, where the cotton blooms and blows.
Why he left his home in the South to roam ‘round the Pole, God only knows.
He was always cold, but the land of gold seemed to hold him like a spell;
Though he’d often say in his homely way that “he’d sooner live in hell.”
On a Christmas Day we were mushing our way over the Dawson trail.
Talk of your cold! through the parka’s fold it stabbed like a driven nail.
If our eyes we’d close, then the lashes froze till sometimes we couldn’t see;
It wasn’t much fun, but the only one to whimper was Sam McGee.
And that very night, as we lay packed tight in our robes beneath the snow,
And the dogs were fed, and the stars o’erhead were dancing heel and toe,
He turned to me, and “Cap,” says he, “I’ll cash in this trip, I guess;
And if I do, I’m asking that you won’t refuse my last request.”
Well, he seemed so low that I couldn’t say no; then he says with a sort of moan:
“It’s the cursed cold, and it’s got right hold till I’m chilled clean through to the bone.
Yet ‘taint being dead—it’s my awful dread of the icy grave that pains;
So I want you to swear that, foul or fair, you’ll cremate my last remains.”
A pal’s last need is a thing to heed, so I swore I would not fail;
And we started on at the streak of dawn; but God! he looked ghastly pale.
He crouched on the sleigh, and he raved all day of his home in Tennessee;
And before nightfall a corpse was all that was left of Sam McGee.
There wasn’t a breath in that land of death, and I hurried, horror-driven,
With a corpse half hid that I couldn’t get rid, because of a promise given;
It was lashed to the sleigh, and it seemed to say: “You may tax your brawn and brains,
But you promised true, and it’s up to you to cremate those last remains.”
Now a promise made is a debt unpaid, and the trail has its own stern code.
In the days to come, though my lips were dumb, in my heart how I cursed that load.
In the long, long night, by the lone firelight, while the huskies, round in a ring,
Howled out their woes to the homeless snows — O God! how I loathed the thing.
And every day that quiet clay seemed to heavy and heavier grow;
And on I went, though the dogs were spent and the grub was getting low;
The trail was bad, and I felt half mad, but I swore I would not give in;
And I’d often sing to the hateful thing, and it hearkened with a grin.
Till I came to the marge of Lake Lebarge, and a derelict there lay;
It was jammed in the ice, but I saw in a trice it was called the “Alice May.”
And I looked at it, and I thought a bit, and I looked at my frozen chum;
Then “Here,” said I, with a sudden cry, “is my cre-ma-tor-eum.”
Some planks I tore from the cabin floor, and I lit the boiler fire;
Some coal I found that was lying around, and I heaped the fuel higher;
The flames just soared and the furnace roared—such a blaze you seldom see;
Then I burrowed a hole in the glowing coal, and I stuffed in Sam McGee.
Then I made a hike, for I didn’t like to hear him sizzle so;
And the heavens scowled, and the huskies howled, and the wind began to blow.
It was icy cold, but the hot sweat rolled down my cheeks, and I don’t know why;
And the greasy smoke in an inky cloak went streaking down the sky.
I do not know how long in the snow I wrestled with grisly fear;
But the stars came out and they danced about ere again I ventured near;
I was sick with dread, but I bravely said: “I’ll just take a peep inside.
I guess he’s cooked, and it’s time I looked;” . . . then the door I opened wide.
And there sat Sam, looking cool and calm, in the heart of the furnace roar;
And he wore a smile you could see a mile, and he said: “Please close that door.
It’s fine in here, but I greatly fear you’ll let in the cold and storm—
Since I left Plumtree, down in Tennessee, it’s the first time I’ve been warm.”
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold; The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
-
yikes....H.S. lit flash backs....
Living in New England most of my life. I’ve always liked this poem. Makes me smile. “There’s nothing like finally being warm, huh Sam?”
Oh crap!
Another global warming screed.
Oh, I LOOOOOVE that poem! I used to have it memorized. Service spoke so eloquently on the hold the north has on us who live here. Thanks, Clive!
My Dad, deceased for many years, used to recite that to us.
On Friday nights, before he’d give us money to go to the skating rink, he’d tease us and say we had to recite it word for word to earn our “skatin” money.
Thanks for bringing back those wonderful memories.
Perfect.
I just got diagnosed with hypertension and the medications they’re giving me make me feel chilled to the bone, just like this guy. I can not get warm.
I’ll be so glad when Global Warming makes it to Oklahoma!
http://www.mochinet.com/poets/service/index.cgi
Searchable database of Robert Service.
The work that has gone into compiling these poems into electronic format started with Project Gutenberg.
The first of Service’s books they compiled was
“The Spell of the Yukon” followed by one or two others.
Some of the books here have been shamelessly copied from
their archives and reformatted into HTML.
However, most of the works here have been typed up by
individuals devoted to preserving the memory and work
of Robert Service.
Two such people that I have immediate knowledge of, on
this regard, is Art Ude and Myself.
This one was one of my favorites. The “Shooting of Dan McGrew” was too.
Huddled here in the warmth of my little office against a cold and snowy New England day, I can still imagine Jean Shepherd reciting that poem over the transistor radio I kept under my pillow as a kid.
> My Dad, deceased for many years, used to recite that to us.
Mine, too. I had totally forgotten about it.
Perhaps, I should read it to my baby grand-daughter some day.
My favorite of his ... "The Law of the Yukon." It was an inspiration to one of my heroes, Jim Elliot (the young missionary pioneer in Ecuador) ... who took the words out of their earthy context and applied them to bold conquests for Christ.
This is the law of the Yukon, and ever she makes it plain:
"Send not your foolish and feeble; send me your strong and your sane--
Strong for the red rage of battle; sane, for I harry them sore;
Send me men girt for the combat, men who are grit to the core;
Swift as the panther in triumph, fierce as the bear in defeat,
Sired of a bulldog parent, steeled in the furnace heat.
Send me the best of your breeding, lend me your chosen ones;
Them will I take to my bosom, them will I call my sons;
Them will I gild with my treasure, them will I glut with my meat;"
************
"And I will not be won by weaklings, subtle, suave and mild,
But by men with the hearts of vikings, and simple faith of a child;
Desperate, strong and resistless, unthrottled by fear or defeat,
Them will I gild with my treasure, them will I glut with my meat."
And then what happened?
Heh. :-)
I first hear this poem and many, many others from my Mother who used to recite poetry to us at nap time when I was a kid.
My husband loves this poem.
Love it....AFAIK, I’m the only FReeper with a R.W. Service poem on my profile page :-D
I also recommend “The Ballad of the Iceworm Cocktail”
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