I lay dreaming as the yardarms howl with ghosts
upon the wind,
screaming down: “Your crew is lost, it’s mutiny once more”
One voice to dare my choices strong
and shed that bitter sleep,
my past the drowning child of its dark and rocky shoals
As tears release and fall like rain the tiller
begs forgiveness,
old memories drift away in fear and sink within themselves
The time has come, as fate calls out to man the heavy sails
and chart a course into the swells
—one final storm to brave
(Dreamsleep: March, 2021)
Categories:
yardarms, life,
Form: Free verse
OLD SAILOR
The old sailor sat on a sea wall
Watching heaving swell of dancing waves
Crowned with foam of swirling white
Hearing shrill cries of seagulls.
Feeling salty spray on weathered face
Closes his eyes remembering
Times long gone of his seafaring youth
Spent beneath mast and billowing sail.
Friends lost overboard in raging storms
And climbing slippery rigging
Pulling in sails, lashing them to yardarms
As monstrous waves broke over the ship.
Shore leave with girl in every port
Getting drunk and spending all his pay
Returning to the ship and hard life on board
Sailor with unruly sea as his home.
Colin Ian Jeffery
Categories:
yardarms, memory, sea,
Form: Free verse
Minuted wind pass'd across
like eternity has last
seconds were passing like gloss
little spots fade in a blast
living i in thou land
away from my roots an own
felt the shimmer my eyes rand
want'd to flee e're were grown
want'd to see th' art of my hand
to spot thou sunset wheat fields
an speed an hug open arms
an see e're offering thou shields
finally sail my ship with yardarms
an hail th' ocean to praise along
Categories:
yardarms, home,
Form: Sonnet