John Masefield

“ Through the loud surf of Los Muertos which is beating in my ears.
I’m the last alive that knows it. All the rest have gone their ways
Killed, or died, or come to anchor in the old Mulatas Cays,
And I go singing, fiddling, old and starved and in despair,
And I know where all that gold is hid, if I were only there.
It’s not the way to end it all. I'm old, and nearly blind,
And an old man's past's a strange thing, for it never leaves his mind. ”

“ Sinking in the sucking quagmires to the sunburn on our breasts,
Heaving over tree-trunks, gasping, damning at the flies and heat,
Longing for a long drink, out of silver, in the ship’s cool lazareet. ”

“ The moon came white and ghostly as we laid the treasure down,
There was gear there’d make a beggarman as rich as Lima Town,
Copper charms and silver trinkets from the chests of Spanish crews,
Gold doubloons and double moidores, louis d’ors and portagues,
Clumsy yellow-metal earrings from the Indians of Brazil, ”