Night Watch

NIGHT WATCH

The breeze falls still and
Flapping, the foresail
Calls time, the wake
Dies back and oh so
Gently
In the undulating swell
With lengthening shadow
She rounds the headland
And eases into safety,
Into port

And the rock dove hangs
On the evening air
In open-wingèd welcome
Of the dying embers
Of the sun:
As tired men on bar-stools
Lift their glasses
In open-throated welcome
Of the golden tinted nectar
Of their gods.

Amidst the gathering gloom
Now homebound
Gulls track the fading
Ever-deepening blue, yet
Far, horizon:
And I am left at peace
To ponder my mortality:
A crystalline fleck
Upon a soft crustacean
Floor.


An evening reflection
Portocolom,
Mallorca
August 2009