THE LEDYARD BRIDGE (1859-1934)

Turn back the years to when the Ledyard Bridge

Spanned the Connecticut at Hanover!

And in the valley, flanked by Occom Ridge,

Where hills of Norwich greet us as before,

See the old covered bridge with mid stone pier

And weathered wooden walls of long ago,

When Dartmouth men and others travelled here

Above the river's unrelenting flow!

Far off, a train screams down Vermont's curved shore

Toward Norwich Station, stolidly defined,

As hurrying feet make resonant the floor

Of our old bridge, where wheels or runners grind,

With harness bells and hoofbeats of the past,

Whose distant echoes ring while memorieslast. -