“The Skipper”

Southampton Press, Thursday, Jan. 21, 1954

In Memoriam

The Rev. Jesse Halsey, D.D.

1882-1954

The sea was always in his eyes

As in his blood;

The English earth his heritage,

His sires, the skippers of proud ships

Out of Southampton’s

New World port

Two hundred years agone.

He lov’d the salt-tang’d air,

The restless, rolling water drew him

From a thousand miles,

Like tides upon his heart

Toward home and rest and peace.

His hands were seaman’s hands,

Busy, apt to any task

To build, to smooth,

To climb where few would dare,

To set a gentle flower,

To bind a wound,

To brush aside a tear,

To pray.

Like season’d oak, his heart,

Handwrought and mellowed,

Weathered fitting by the foul and fair;

He knew his craft—the hearts of men

And like his Master,

No stranger he to ax and plane,

Or storm-toss’d day,

The satisfying weariness of eventide;

His art—the ships he built—

The lives he sent out from his ways

Sound wrought and rigged,

To wrest and bring

A hard-won cargo safely home.

His heart a skipper’s Heart,

The Master’s Order, his;

And certain as a chart that fact

To all

Who signed on in his company.

No wonder to his mates,

The Master, satisfied,

Called out, “Cast off!”

And he obeyed.

By Samuel Gregory Warr

Assistant to Dr. Halsey, Seventh Presbyterian Church, Cincinnati, Ohio, 1940-1941.