Northwest Passage - Stan Rogers
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Ah, for just one time, I would take the Northwest Passage
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To find the hand of Franklin, reaching for the Beaufort Sea.
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Tracing one warm line, through a land so wide and savage, and
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Make a Northwest Passage, to the sea.
1.
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Westward from the Davis Strait, 'tis there was said to lie,
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The sea route to the Orient, for which so many died,
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Seeking gold and glory, leaving weathered broken bones, and
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A long forgotten lonely cairn of stones.
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2.
Three centuries thereafter, I take passage over land,
In the footsteps of brave Kelso, where his "sea of flowers" began.
Watching cities rise before me, then behind me sink again,
This tardiest explorer, driving hard, across the plains.
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3.
And through the night behind the wheel, the mileage clicking west,
I think upon Mackenzie, David Thompson, and the rest,
Who cracked the mountain ramparts, and did show a path for me,
To race the roaring Fraser, to the sea.
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4.
How then am I so different, from the first men through this way,
Like them, I left a settled life, I threw it all away,
To seek a Northwest Passage, at the call of many men,
To find there, but the road back home again.
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