The Lament of the Gutter Lately Filled Up by an Unpoetical Municipality
Old residents of Port Elizabeth will remember the kloof running down between Donkin Street and Constitution Hill, which was spanned by a rude wooden foot-bridge just opposite Dr. Edwards’ residence. The kloof having been filled up now forms the site of the row of houses on the right-hand side of Donkin Street. This municipal improvement forms the subject of the following pitiful “Lament.” Whatever may be thought of the merit of the verses, the author takes some credit for an eye to the “practical,” for the attempt to lead off the surface water through an underground culvert, resulted in the catastrophe predicted in the concluding verses within a very short time after the completion of the work.
Oh list, good folks, a tale of woe,
A tale of dark oppression,
Let briny tears your cheeks down flow
In sorrowful procession.
Till late I trickled down the glen,
In sunbeams gaily sparkling;
But now, entombed by heartless men,
I creep on cold and darkling.
Beneath a huge chaotic mass
Of rubbish vile I mutter;
Mid frogs and fungi rank, alas!
A melancholy gutter.
No more my channel, decked with green,
Relieves the eye aweary.
Its verdant slopes no more are seen,
But all around is dreary.
No more the breeze, with fitful sigh,
Along my bed breathes mildly,
No more, when Boreas blusters high,
My caverns echo wildly.
The rustic bridge, that bound my banks
In brotherhood together,
Is torn away, and its rude planks
Are gone—“the Board” knows whither.
Away! a dire revenge I’ll brew;
My rage, meanwhile, I’ll bung tight.
That sordid “Board” the day shall rue
When next I see the sunlight.
When turbid torrents rushing pass
Adown my peeping square holes,
Right through this execrable mass,
I, madman like, will tear holes.
I’ll heave aloft the lumb’ring load,
And crashing down I’ll toss it,
Till in the middle of the road18
I make a “fixed deposit.”
William Selwyn.