long-distance marriage
I sat on the terrace, thinking of my children and their
mother who had lived in a pool behind the houses
She they became adults had begged me to set her free, I relented drove her to the coast, and saw her jump with joy
Our four children were obese full of blubber had tiny arms and feet, which they gradually lost as they became adult
I gave our children to their mother and saw my family
swim to the Azores, where the sea is mild and there is plenty of food.
I was on a ship when I passed the island they came alongside flippers waving.
Do you know them, the captain asked.
Yes, they are my children with their mother
“You are mad,” he said. Indeed, but that is the price one has to pay for loving a dolphin.
Dark water swimmer
If I were a deep-sea diver, I would swim to the Azores
were the water is not so cold; meet up with dolphins
that remembered me from my time on ships when
waving to them from the deck
They would feed me sardines since I’m too slow to catch
anyone alone
When I meet a tiger shark, I will bow my head, show
respect and call him my lordship; messages will be sent
“Don’t touch this man, as he is not a seal.”
I will go ashore in Madeira, get drunk in a bar and when
they arrest and try to deport me, I will tell them the sea
is my home, and they will take me on a helicopter and
push me back to my forever home
This will be witnessed by all creatures of the ocean, who
will say: “Now look, there swims a hero.”
"I wandered lonely as a cloud"
William Wordsworth.
I wandered lonely as a wave.
slowly, upon the ocean's tide.
O'er depths of a watery grave
alone, in current's wake I ride.
Always moving, I cannot stop
I rise and fall then curl and drop.
I've ebbed and flowed on foreign shores.
Splashed on boats with their sails unfurled.
From tropic isles to the Azores,
welcomed surfers around the world
and tried my best to settle down
in the port city of Cape Town.
My wandering days will not end.
I'm diluted from time to time,
still a wave but with a new blend
depending on the ocean's clime.
I like lapping on a sandy beach,
keeping just out of human reach.
Dolphins swim within my deep swells,
but I don't belong to their pod
and I cannot befriend seashells,
halibut, squid, lobster or cod.
I'm destined to wander and roam.
It's quite lonely without a home.
September 20, 2022
I Wandered Lonely As... Challenge Contest
Sponsored by Natasha L Scragg
The Dolphin
He sat on the terrace thinking of his four children
their mother was a dolphin who lived in a pool behind the houses.
She begged me to set her free, I did and saw her swim away
jumping of joy
Her children were obese full of blubber, and had small arms and feet.
When we went on my boat fishing, they, when catching fish
ate them raw.
When old enough, my children joined their mother had settled
near the Azores, where the sea was mild.
I was on a ship passing the island when they swam alongside and waved.
The transformation was total. They had flippers.
The captain asked, “do you know them?
Yes, I said they are my children.
You are mad, he said, yes that is the price to pay for loving
a dolphin.
The phone conversation
Late in the evening, my daughter brought me an apparat
that made it possible to talk to the dead.
The first on the line was an electrician complaining
I hadn’t paid him; sure, how could I pay you when
You died before I had money ready?
You could have bought flowers and visited the funeral.
You are right I could but omitted to do so
Because I had no money and it was raining that day.
You could use an umbrella. I haven’t got one,
No self-respecting seaman will be seen alive with one.
Besides I was on a ship near the Azores when you died.
This man always complaining, static noise and other
Voices disturbed the talk.
I thought some people never stop moaning however
Long they have been dead.
MY LIFE
Born in Dublin on Saint Patrick's Day
School; spelling champ; steady girl
Senior Prom; graduation; went away
Air Force career; traveled the world
Turkey; Germany; England; Japan
Korea; Vietnam; Philippines; Guam
Austria; Hawaii; Azores; Alaska; all grand
Thirty eight contiguous states fit the plan
Fully retired -- more to be told -- stay tuned
22 September 2018
For the contest sponsored by Anthony Slausen
Atlantic storms had taken the main mast
For seven weeks we drifted helplessly
Fresh water and food were running out fast
There was talk below deck of mutiny.
Hunger, boredom and thirst were taking grip
As a boy I saw the dark side of men
To keep order the captain used the whip
I feared we would never see home again.
A sailor on watch shouted "land ahoy"
The wind picked up and drifted us along
Crew were happy and were now full of joy
Some sang the shanty, the wanderer's song.
Captain Smith cried out "it is the Azores"
The beautiful sight of its distant shores.
Written on 19th June 2018
Truth, be told
On an old fashion gramophone, they played sweet
music in a small cove made for two, the young man
smiled this sleek woman was to become his bride.
A big seal came on to shore dragged the woman in
to the sea and under, when surfacing with the seal
she smiled and waved but didn`t come ashore,
kept on jumping and playing and her leanness made
look like a seal and she was indeed turning into one.
Finally she and the bigger seal com to the shoreline
she told him her life was the ocean and she and her
the new man was swimming to the Azores where she
would meet his family. The young man took his
gramophone, sun cream, towels and walked home.
No one believed his accurate explanation, he got
life for drowning his girlfriend.
A different Sonnet
Sunlight from early morn and not
Far from here the Azores a cyclone
Lashes onto shores and makes the island
Taller and more meagre
Stealing top- soil near the coast and
The rocks tremble, will it not end.
I sit in the winter sun tanning old leather
And not a straw moves in the stillness
I drove down to my little Savannah stopped
And walked a bit and I tell no lie when I tell
You I saw a pride of lions in the tall grass
And a crocodile was eating a deer that had
Come to drink in the ditch.
Time matters here once the plain was a sea
Slow changes we can`t see because we do
Not live long enough, so let me enjoy this
Moment look idly at drifting clouds
Before my savannah turns into a sea again.
In green/blue shimmering shades
Alien squarbs have been sighted
From southern tip to northern shores
Prismatic globules lighted
Collectively in the Azores
Theresa Stephens
21st June 2014
Syria
In the ugly streets of Homs I lied on my back snipers´ fire hit
walls and filled my nose with cement dust and the horrid
smell of early death, the aftermath of abused young men
who have only murder and agony as a leading light to their
short future that holds no promise of peace.
Beside me a box shaped as a heart I knew it was a hand
grenade about to explode, soldiers came the grenade was
defused. They carried me in chair to the ocean´s strand.
High tide came I was free to join the dolphins, I had tried
life ashore it was fun for some time, but I always longed to
join my tribe, where I need no speak and just be.
We swim between the Azores and the coast of Portugal and
I`m bored to tears, which happens those who have grown out
of their old culture, but nevertheless I falsely warn dolphins
not to leave the sea, be tempted by the dry land´s pearls made
of tears spilt by us who will never get home, kitschy neon light
and New Orleans´ jazz like it sounded in 1964.