Bolting Mare Rock

Bolting Mare Rock


Coos Bay, Oregon

1.

Winter’s awash inside the gray,
hard heart of the sea.
Pounding war fists strike against
reef and shore.
Out of her depth, the boat leans, bruised,
thigh battered, barely afloat.
Oil from her tanks pools around tatter
of nets, spoiling the deck with drenched
cordage spilling, tossed by chaos
into a frenzy. Captain with crew ride
the bucking fury.

No dry skin.
Feet slip under each wave’s lash.
The captain’s son, as fine a seaman as any,
stretches to secure a hatch as
the specterous sea plans its rape,
swells around him,
making the small boat lurch.
When brow proud it rises,
one of the crew is missing.

Waters awash between this village
and the heartless heart of the sea.
Women shudder, drenched at the point.
Watching, afraid of what there is
most to fear.
A vessel is galloping toward
Bolting Mare Rock.
There is no drowning without a deep,
uneasy gasp inside the belly of waves
as burning water is drunk
and the body sinks into whirling exile
snatched from the arms of those that love.
The sea is a lover too.
Will have its quarry; never releasing
what it deeply kisses.
Whispering as it possesses:
No profit to a seaman’s life,
only worry.

2.

Prayer

O God, an infidel of the air,
I fear not. I am Man, hair of your hair,
wind spittled water whipped, flying
as I heave with the seethe down under.
Transfigured and unrepentant, I dare
the miraculous waves to throw me up.

O God, though time cramp
my toil and I am phantom
cast between dreaming shores,
my blood sings as it flies.
When sea wise no longer,
mingling undone
and my heart sinks like a drowning star
to rest in some forgotten harbor,
my soul airy and shirtless,
shall rise above water
to sail once more.

- Scott Malby

Posted over on Motherbird