Adrift! A little boat adrift!
  And night is coming down!
Will no one guide a little boat
  Unto the nearest town?

So Sailors say -- on yesterday--
  Just as the dusk was brown
One little boat gave up its strife
  And gurgled down and down.

So angels say -- on yesterday --
  Just as the dawn was red
One little boat -- o'erspent with gales --
Retrimmed its masts -- redecked its sails --
  [Exultant, onward sped!]1

About the headline (FAQ)

View original text (without footnotes)
¹ another version of Dickinson: "And shot -- exultant on!"

Text Authorship:

• by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886), no title, written c1858 [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

• by Libby Larsen (b. 1950), "Adrift! A little boat adrift!", 1999 [satb chorus a cappella], from By a departing light, no. 4. [
   text not verified 
  ]
• by Daniel Rogers Pinkham (1923 - 2006), "A little boat adrift", from Called Home, no. 1. [
   text not verified 
  ]

Available translations, adaptations, and transliterations (if applicable):

• FRE French (Français) (Guy Laffaille) , copyright © 2009, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
• GER German (Deutsch) (Bertram Kottmann) , title 1: "Es treibt umher! Ein kleines Boot!", copyright © 2016, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website: 2007-09-21
Line count: 13
Word count: 71