Living Poetry--The Northwest Passage

We have always enjoyed Robert Lewis Stevenson's A Child's Garden of Verses, but years ago, I realized my young ones were listening to "The Northwest Passage" without half grasping its meaning. With evenings illuminated by electric lamps and a house warmed by central heat, my modern girls could not begin to imagine the eerie experience a simple trip up the stairs might have been for children of another age.

One twilight, we read the poem and waited expectantly--not switching on a single light--as darkness descended upon the house. Suddenly, "the sunless hours," barely noticed in the past, took on a measure of significance for them. The girls huddled close to me as the last rays of dusk died down and tittered with excitement as I lit one small candle. Shadows danced and glinted on the walls, and the windows mirrored back the lonesome light. We all stood up to look around, and for the first time noticed "our pictures painted as we pass, like pictures, on the window glass."

Moments later, I announced that it was time to walk upstairs to their room. Knowing it would enhance the experience for the others, seven-year-old Agnes pointedly objected to the notion of ascending the gloomy staircase with only the feeble candle to light our way. Her younger sisters cried out excitedly, "That's just how the child in the poem felt!" Holding hands and following the flickering candle, it was easy to see what Stevenson meant when he wrote that the jet-black night, "crawls in the corners, hiding from the light" and "moves with the moving flame." With each new step, we could plainly see, "the shadow of the balusters, the shadow of the lamp, the shadow of the child that goes to bed--all the wicked shadows coming, tramp, tramp, tramp, with the black night overhead."

Reaching the top landing, the girls could just make out the door to their room at the far end of the hall. Light escaped through the crack near the floor, and the intrepid older two could not resist running ahead to fling it open. To their surprise, I had left all the lights in that one room burning, so they would "come from out the cold and gloom into [their] warm and cheerful room" where they found a tray of milk and cookies waiting on the craft table.

Simple as it was, "The Northwest Passage" instantly rose in the ranks to one of their all-time favorite poems. Twelve year old Agnes passed by earlier as I typed the text of the poem for this post and beamed, "Remember the time we climbed the stairs with the candle?"

Indeed I do--and I am delighted that she does too!

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The Northwest Passage

I. Good Night

WHEN the bright lamp is carried in,
The sunless hours again begin;
O’er all without, in field and lane,
The haunted night returns again.

Now we behold the embers flee
About the firelit hearth; and see
Our pictures painted as we pass,
Like pictures, on the window-glass.

Must we to bed indeed? Well, then,
Let us arise and go like men,
And face with an undaunted tread
The long black passage up to bed.

Farewell, O brother, sister, sire!
O pleasant party round the fire!
The songs you sing, the tales you tell,
Till far to-morrow, fare ye well!

II. Shadow March

ALL round the house is the jet-black night;
It stares through the window-pane;
It crawls in the corners, hiding from the light,
And it moves with the moving flame.

Now my little heart goes a-beating like a drum,
With the breath of Bogie in my hair,
And all round the candle the crooked shadows come,
And go marching along up the stair.

The shadow of the balusters, the shadow of the lamp,
The shadow of the child that goes to bed—
All the wicked shadows coming, tramp, tramp, tramp,
With the black night overhead.

II. In Port

LAST, to the chamber where I lie
My fearful footsteps patter nigh,
And come from out the cold and gloom
Into my warm and cheerful room.

There, safe arrived, we turn about
To keep the coming shadows out,
And close the happy door at last
On all the perils that we past.

Then, when mamma goes by to bed,
She shall come in with tip-toe tread,
And see me lying warm and fast
And in the Land of Nod at last.

(From "A Child's Garden of Verses" by Robert Louis Stevenson)

Comments

[Karen E.]

Beautiful, Alice! What precious memories you are creating for your children.

[Happyheartsmom]

Alice, I love this and we adore this poem, well almost anything from RLS, but we'll have to try this, although we have no stairs, I love how you made the poem come alive for your girls!! And of course the memories they will always have...awesome!