Hope.
Wild seas of tossing, writhing waves,
A wreck half-sinking in the tortuous gloom;
One man clings desperately, while Boreas raves,
And helps to blot the rays of moon and star,
Then comes a sudden flash of light, which gleams on shores afar.
This poem is in the public domain. Published in Poem-a-Day on July 19, 2020 by the Academy of American Poets.
“Hope.” originally appeared in Violets and Other Tales (The Monthly Review, 1895)
Alice Dunbar-Nelson
Alice Ruth Moore Dunbar-Nelson was born on July 19, 1875, in New Orleans. Her mother was Patricia Wright, a seamstress, and her father, Joseph Moore, was a merchant marine. Nelson earned a teaching degree at Straight University (now, Dillard University) in 1892 at age seventeen. She then taught in the local public school system as an elementary school teacher until 1931.