Classic Poem

The cable cars swing up the hill,
The cable cars swing down
And with them swings the roaring trade
Of San Francisco town.

A gull-gray city by the sea
The gray wall-sided warships win,
With sunlight on her windy hills,
And gray fog drifting in.

The tide goes up to Suisun,
The river fumbles at the Strait,
Westward the long Pacific swells
Slip sidling past the Golden Gate.

A green tide flows along the hills
And washes down into the sea,
The shadows of the waiting ships
Are darkly green as any tree.

And when the water lies at ease
And hills and sea melt into night,
With a slow sound the ferries pace
A milky way of light.