I took a ferry across the St. Lawrence to take me to the North Country,
To the ore mines where even the newborns hack iron dust,
And their eyes are tinted iron red.

The river rolled and rocked away from Gaspé,
Heaving in the francophone tongue,
Leaving Evangeline behind me in the evening.

A Frenchman was phlegming into the sink behind me.

The sky was dulling,
The fleur de lys flying anyway in the wind.
Roll on, St. Lawrence, I groaned in English.
All else on board chattered away in French
Over their sovereign particulars.

That was the first time in my life I was truly on my own.

Patrick O'Reilly

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-ferry-across-the-st-lawrence/