On the Mississippi

Through wild and tangled forests
   The broad, unhasting river flows—
   Spotted with rain-drops, gray with night;
     Upon its curving breast there goes
A lonely steamboat's larboard light,
       A blood-red star against the shadowy oaks;
Noiseless as a ghost, through greenish gleam
Of fire-flies, before the boat's wild scream—
          A heron flaps away
          Like silence taking flight.
Credit

From Prairie Songs: Being Chants Rhymed and Unrhymed of the Level Lands of the Great West by Hamlin Garland, published by Stone and Kimball, 1893. This poem is in the public domain.