I

Tired
the long road ends
by a sea wall
The engine dies
to cries of estuary birds
to halyards’ **** and tinge
A lake of light set in night’s cloudscape
brims over the western marshland
to seaward a dense darkness
On the ferry’s step
ear close to the brown water
a part-song sings the ebb tide’s flow

II

Threading into the marshland
a braid of cloud-reflected water
of oval sedge and common reed
In amongst the brown canes perspective vanishes
only by mind’s foreshortening or body’s levitation
is there sight beyond the creeping rootstock
By the river path a leaf
pearled with glazed dew glistening
dew grabbing the photographic eye
Standing backs to the horizon
a sculpted triad of bronzed ancestors
watch over the summer rites of music

III

This ****** field
moves clamorously under the feet
waiting waiting for the sea’s kiss
Proud-coloured the boats here
resting poised on railway sleepers
beside their tractored guardians
How to know which way to turn
which view to hold for memory’s stamp
this patient sky this slow exhaling sea
This foreground flow of white-grey-brown pebbles
each sensibly-sized for the hand in the pocket
yet substantially-singular on the window’s sill

I was part of the crew of a Sloop-of-War
That had sailed in the Caribbean,
We were caught asleep in the port one night
By the crew of a Brigantine.
They loosed a broadside, seven guns
As the Skull and the Bones flew high,
And I was dragged to the pirate ship
Where they said, ‘You’ll serve, or die!’

There wasn’t a choice to be had back then,
So I climbed aloft on the mast,
Setting the rig of the fore topsail
And making the halyards fast,
They made me stay in the Crows Nest then
To be swept by the wind and rain,
With only a couple of tots of ***
To deal with my aches, and pain.

I kept lookout on the pirate brig
For His Majesty’s ships, and land,
They knew we wouldn’t stand much of a chance
As a Privateer Brigand,
We sought to shelter within a cove
In an island, not on a chart,
And rowed ashore in a longboat there
With the bosun, Jacob Harte.

Captain Keague had stayed on the ship
With the bloodiest of his crew,
The rest of us had been pressed to sea
To do what we had to do.
We filled our barrels with water from
A rill that flowed from the hill,
And gathered fruit that we’d never seen
From trees with an earthy feel.

The trees had tendrils that waved about,
And trunks that were black and charred,
Just like a fire had raged there once
And left them, battle-scarred.
A voice rang out in a clearing there,
‘Hey mates, head back to the sea,
Don’t let the tendrils fasten on you
Or you’ll all end up like me.’

And deep in the trunk was a human face
With its skin all burnt and black,
The pain was etched on his weathered skin,
‘Look out, these trees attack!
We tried to burn them away, but they
Caught every one of the crew,
That fruit you carry is poison, mates,
They’ll be the end of you!’

The tendrils whipped and the tendrils slashed
And they wrapped round Jacob Harte,
He hadn’t much time to scream before
They seemed to tear him apart,
And each of the crew was tangled there,
Was absorbed into a tree,
I made it back to the beach that day
Though I’m anything but free.

The roots of the trees had reached on out
To the Brigantine in the bay,
Curled like manacles round its decks
And torn its masts away,
They dragged it up on the sandy beach
And they crushed it to a shell,
Caught the crew in their tendrils too
And Captain Keague as well.

I’ll put this note in a bottle, send it
Floating off in the sea,
Hoping that someone picks it up,
It’s the last you’ll hear from me.
Don’t let them seed in the world out there
These tendril trees are cursed,
And keep this Island from off the map,
If not, I fear the worst!

David Lewis Paget

From the time the land had fallen away
He could only see the sea,
And the billowing sails, the wooden rails
And the halyards, struggling free,
While a silence gathered beyond the creak
Of the masts, that seemed quite odd,
As up in the crows nest he could see
The massive domain of God.

For out to the far horizon, there
Was nothing to catch the eye,
But the heaving swell that he knew full well
And the vast expanse of the sky,
They merged in a distant thin blue line
On the curvature of the earth,
That disappeared as the evening fell
And the stars were given birth.

And there in the glow of the hanging lamp
He heard the bells of the watch,
As they hauled on the final moonraker
Above the sky sail, top,
The bow bit in to the salty swell
As the frigate picked up speed,
And dipped and sprayed on the carronade
In a race for a monarch’s need.

For down below was a courier
Locked in by a cabin door,
Who carried a secret parchment scroll
God speed to a distant shore.
Dressed as a pale midshipman, but
In truth, and without a lie,
The courier was a fretful girl
And the crew would have wondered, ‘Why?’

Why take a ******* a Naval ship
Who would bring bad luck to the crew?
Nobody was supposed to know,
But he in the crows nest knew.
He’d seen her shower in a secret place
He could see from the top of the mast,
But kept his lip, for he knew the ship
Would be wrecked if the crew had guessed.

She came on out for a breath of air
Just after he came off watch,
Deep in the dark of the after deck
With the gun deck all awash,
A giant wave swept her to the rail
So he seized, and held her tight,
As the water dripped from her frightened face
And her hair shook out in the night.

‘Pray sir, don’t let them discover me,
I am only here for the King,’
He smiled at her in the darkness, said
‘You must grant me just one thing,
A tender kiss from your perfect lips
And I swear, I’ll let you be.’
She said, ‘You swear?’ and she kissed him then,
But a grumble rose from the sea.

And thunder off in the distance rolled
As the girl then turned and fled,
Back to her locked in cabin then,
Back to her cabin bed.
But lightning flashed, and a thunderbolt
Crashed over the masts and stays,
While the lightning flash destroyed the mast
Where he’d spent so many days.

The crew were cutting the mast away
And cast it over the side,
While he hung on to a rail and stay
As the ship tossed in the tide,
A shadow rose from the deep that night
A demon known to the crew,
‘There must be a woman here on board,’
They screamed, ‘but nobody knew!’

The ****** went to her cabin door
Then knocked, and she let him in,
‘Your secret’s out, you’ll have to leave
If you want to save your skin.
I’m going to let out the painter now,
And set you out in a boat,
I’ll join you there if I can, I swear
For this ship won’t stay afloat.’

And somewhere out in that great domain
That God has kept for his own,
There floats a tiny clinker boat
With a couple, all alone.
The frigate lies in the heaving deep
On the bed of a fretful sea,
One kiss had cost a King his throne
And the loss of a colony.

David Lewis Paget

"Not bad for a cloudy day,"
She said as the clouds gave way
To the torrents of rain which pelted my head
As the stoplight said 'yield', then blinked harshly red
The cars as they skittered across the wet street
Were coupled as urgently with running feet
And as water from roadside splashed up on the walk
We gathered in bookstores for coffee and talk
The flags were brought in on their damp, cotton lines
And the halyards stayed free from the rope which entwines
We with our coffee felt free as the wind
And we laughed as the thought remained:
Please don't rescind

In the dream (or perhaps it is forseeing) it is cold,
The air carries whispers of ice
That cut through the warmth of my skin
Like knives,
The quay is deserted,
Quiet aside from the occasional
Breeze induced moan from
A beer bottle tossed casually away
To lie discarded and thereby
A bit like me,

As I single up the mooring lines
Of the boat below me its movement
Becomes greater,
As if shunning the cold stillness
Of the land,
And seeing this I feel kinship
With the waking hull,
And a sense of shared impending journey
To the grey seas
Beyond the harbour wall,

As I work the halyards and
Aged sails creak up the mast
The breeze becomes more evident
In the brisk flapping of canvas,
Rime frost on the gunwhales gives way
To dark hand prints as I steady myself
Moving forward and aft,
Steadily prepping for departure
In a routine well known
Across decades,

Finally all is ready,
The wind picks up,
Sundering the clouds to reveal
A clear black sky studded in diamonds,
The navigation lights
From far galaxies come to light my way
As the backed foresail
Pushes the bows away,
Then with a creak the boom quells
The flapping main,

Approaching the harbour mouth
The wind rises further and a few
Long lazy yet driven rollers
Make their presence felt,
The heel increases as the bow tastes freedom,
Nav lights on the breakwater are
Unnaturally bright but no one sees
Nor waves goodbye,
Nor ever will again for tonight
I that was James just crossed the bar

The wind sighed in the rigging
and the sea murmured deep.
Better get some rest my bully boys
for you’ll get but little sleep.

Wind devils whistled a warning
halyards thrummed in the blast,
better take in sail afore the gale,
came the order at long last.

Up aloft and lively!
reef the main in hard.
claw it in and hold it,
lash it to the yard.

Heed not the winds drear moaning,
nor yet the thundering sea,
but cling to the mast
in the icy blast,
for it hath the strength of a tree.

Take shelter now my hearties,
for there’s little can be done,
the tempest’s force drives us from our course
and we’ll have to turn and run.

As the night grew black and thunder
drowned our weary sighs,
we ran ‘fore the storm and hoped,
for a sight of the mornings skies.

It sits there on the sideboard
Or on the mantle shelf,
And after such a long time
You don’t notice it yourself.
But should you have a visitor
Or younger child come by
It will spark interest anew
And gasps of “Me oh my!”

It’s then the curious wonder
How the ship was put inside,
And where the opening’s concealed
And was it hard to hide?
And if you put it in there
How many times you tried?
And if it went in through the neck
How could it be so wide?

It’s then you tell the story
Of going to the store
To find a bottle of good clear glass
With a shape worth planning for.
Dimple Haig is famous,
Carduh’s pretty fair,
The first one is triangular,
The other one is square.

The bottle must be decanted,
When empty cleaned and dried,
And a careful measure taken
Of the dimensions inside.
It’s then you render drawings
Of the ship you want to make,
And plan out going backwards
Every step you’ll have to take.

First you carve the hull
Of wood with grain that’s fine,
Then step the masts with hinges
So they fold down in a line.
You add the sails and rigging,
Check how they’ll *****
When’s time to pull the halyards
Through the bottle’s neck.

It takes months to finish
Doing a little every night,
I had my children watching
And remarking at the sight.
They saw me put in plasticine
To mold and shape the ocean
And carve wave crests with a spoon
To give the water motion.

When at last the time is right
And everything is ready
You carefully set the ship upon
The sea and hold it steady.
Then pulling on each halyard
The sails are slowly raised
And those who watch the process
Stand enchanted and amazed.

Windchime halyards
Swaying in tune with the tides
Night time lullaby