XVIII

I was wearing a green dress.
I was wearing a green dress and I was running
across the lilting boat deck
For what reason, I still do not know.
I heard shouts and cries and prayers inside my head
that echoed back for miles and miles;
Dear God, let this be a dream
Dear God, let us live
Dear God
where are you now?

The sky was dark and the air was cold
And for a fleeting moment I wished for a fur stole
and diamonds
before I realized that I might sink
from the solid weight of those priceless commodities.

I was wearing a green dress and I was running
Twirling in circles as if in a daze
Searching for someone- anyone
But no one was there. They were all gone.

I was all but gone.

Though I let a lifeboat cradle me safely away
I couldn’t bear the shouts and cries and prayers
that echoed

echoed

XVII

Sometimes I still see the light
filtering through the dining hall windows
and remember long hours of laughter
shared over brandy.
I remember my son, dapper in
a suit and tie
and how he wooed the women with
stories of glory
and battles on foreign shores
which I can still animate
in the colored glass of the windows.

I still see the china
punctual and pristine
stacked like the trunks of
trees
ring upon ring upon ring.
I know in my heart that they are yet
unbroken
-they, and the windows too
my soul knows they will be
as they were
for always and always more
until the Lady is forgotten.

XVI

Good heavens, what a racket!
Midnight, and they expect us to
Put the kettle on?
Ready empty rooms?
Get the ladders?
What is going on?

We steam through the clear air
towards an unseen disaster
picking our way through ice
and churning waters;
all up too early
yes, too fast

and it’s getting colder still
we’re beginning to worry now
What’s wrong with Titanic?

No, maybe I don’t want to
know.

Yes, I’d rather go back to bed.

XV

God almighty,
Have you ever seen such
a gorgeous vessel?
Linin’ up before it makes
all us lads from Southampton
gleam like steel ourselves
--right, and westward we go

Maybe this’ll be my ticket,
men
to a life worth living above ground
wherever this miracle ship sails me
I’ll go
just the sea and I.

If I marry someday,
it’ll be a **** near sign from God.
I’ve got me a lassie back in
Donegal,
Pretty as they come;
Her hymns are as soft as angel
Wings
In a world too cruel.

Yes, I’ll tell her
soon as I reach shore

but for now, It’s westward
I go…

XIV

In the silent night we thought we could hear
Water lapping against distant shores;
Constant reminders of the cruel
Twist of fate.
I shivered alone, skin prickling
As door pieces floated by alongside
Empty life vests
Bodies with darkened eyes
All listlessly floating to somewhere
Out there

Anyone still left had ten minutes to go.

Just enough time for a prayer.

XIII

I was dead when they rescued me.
They pressed cold palm upon palm
to my breast
checking for that graphical mess of a beating
that signified their work well done.
But I would not be that easy.

I saw the light.
It was beautiful, and shaped like
my father
Who braided my hair better than every woman
on the block
And took me to see the countryside even in
the pouring rain.

The light was my sister
gently taking my hand
and brushing my hair
and her hair
and our doll’s hair
(that we were too old for anyway)--
God, I miss her.

In the light
I saw myself
in a blue dress.
My hair was the water
that churned below titanic bows.

A gasping breath.

Then I could feel my heart
Beat

XII**

Pretty white-feathered wine
swirls in my glass like the sea
and I can feel her watching me
watching her
as the time trickles through an hourglass.

From here I see
her flashing-train-car-window
freckles
smiling back at me
gentle origami-winged laughter
settles on my eyelashes
as her rose-red drink
stains what was once plain.

-Lord, that smile
like a stitched-up killer
of my mind
yet still philharmonically sound
I draw her near,
“Dive with me.
Stay with me.”