America is Hard to See*

Robert Frost

Columbus may have worked the wind

A new and better way to Ind

And also proved the world a ball,

But how about the wherewithal?

Not just for scientific news

Had the Queen backed him for a cruise.

Remember he had made the test

Finding the East by sailing West.

But had he found it? Here he was

Without one trinket from Ormuz

To save the Queen from family censure

For her investment in his future.

There had been something strangely wrong

With every coast he tried along.

He could imagine nothing barrener.

The trouble was with him the mariner.

He wasn’t off a mere degree;

His reckoning was off a sea.

And to intensify the drama

Another mariner Da Gama

Came just then sailing into port

From the same general resort,

And with the gold in hand to show for

His claim it was another Ophir.

Had but Columbus known enough

He might have boldly made the bluff

That better than Da Gama’s gold

He had been given to behold

The race’s future trial place,

A fresh start for the human race.

He might have fooled them in Madrid.

I was deceived by what he did.

If I had had my way when young

I should have had Columbus sung

As a god who had given us

A more than Moses’ exodus.

But all he did was spread the room

Of our enacting out the doom

Of being in each other’s way,

And so put off the weary day

When we would have to put our mind

On how to crowd and still be kind.

For these none too apparent gains

He got no more than dungeon chains

And such posthumous renown

(A country named for him, a town,

A holiday) as where he is,

He may not recognize for his.

They say his flagship’s unlaid ghost

Still probes and dents our rocky coast

With animus approaching hate,

And for not turning out a strait

He has cursed every river mouth

From fifty north to fifty south.

Someday our navy I predict

Will take in tow this derelict

And lock him through Culebra Cut,**

His eyes as good (or bad) as shut

To all the modern works of man

And all we call American.

America is hard to see.

Less partial witnesses than he

In book on book have testified

They could not see it from outside—

Or inside either for that matter.

We know the literary chatter.

Columbus, as I say, will miss

All he owes to the artifice

Of tractor-plow and motor-drill.

To naught but his own force of will,

Or at most some Andean quake,

Will he ascribe this lucky break.

High purpose makes the hero rude:

He will not stop for gratitude.

But let him show his haughty stern

To what was never his concern

Except as it denied him way

To fortune-hunting in Cathay.

He will be starting pretty late.

He’ll find that Asiatic state

Is about tired of being looted

While having its beliefs disputed.

*NEW 휘트니뮤지엄 특별전 '미국은 보기 어려워(America is Hard to See)'

**An artificial valley that cuts through the continental divide in Panama, forming part of the Panama Canal

Robert Lee Frost (1874-1963) 

American poet. His work was initially published in England before it was published in America. He is highly regarded for his realistic depictions of rural life and his command of American colloquial speech.[2] His work frequently employed settings from rural life in New England in the early twentieth century, using them to examine complex social and philosophical themes. One of the most popular and critically respected American poets of the twentieth century, Frost was honored frequently during his lifetime, receiving four Pulitzer Prizes for Poetry. He became one of America's rare "public literary figures, almost an artistic institution." He was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal in 1960 for his poetical works. On July 22, 1961, Frost was named Poet laureate of Vermont. http://wikipedia.org

  

  *NEW 휘트니뮤지엄 특별전 '미국은 보기 어려워(America is Hard to See)'