Epitaph for a Sailor


Content? You never were. You dared
Even the edge of the ocean:
A moment unmoving and exultant where
The cliffside rose into the air,
And down you would plunge

                                Then, suddenly -
As though the waters could not hold you pent -
Burst out triumphantly in arm,
White sails mounting the wind spent
From having wrestled with a god. Content?
One cannot even trust you, lying there.


8 comments:

  1. Short link - http://bit.ly/s4sailor

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  2. Oooh, Samuel, I like this one.

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  3. So evocative-- i love "a moment unmoving and exultant"-- a brilliant homage to that wayfaring volition I associate with the true mariner and esp. Odysseus...xxxj

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  4. Perhaps that why they chose such a large stone, to make sure he could never get up again. My Magpie this week is A Plot Both Great and Grand.

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  5. Oh I do like this - brilliant imagery.

    Anna :o]

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  6. true, well put.

    welcome sharing a random or relevant poetry with us today.

    :)

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For you I wish that these poems were rubies, borne by my own caravan from Xi'an out of Shaanxi, through Persia, along the northern Silk Road.

- S. Peralta, Twelve Stones on a Necklace

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