Ferry Fugue

Image borrowed from Yahoo

Ferry Fugue

There you stand spread-legged
against the Salish wind,
with the wide white deck beneath you
and the autumn’s chill knifing
through your long coat,
fluttering the silken ends
of your East Indian scarf,
wearing stylish sunglasses
as a wind break, feeling coquettish
with your tall collar up
like a dun spinnaker before the breeze--
hands deep in your warm pockets,
smiling and humming a lovely melody
winged to you by gulls,
and the boisterous thump-thump
of the great ship’s throbbing engines,
mixed with the lilt of children’s laughter
and the woodwind bark
of someone’s lap dog left in a car,

the ferry blithely parting the grey-gray water,
churning up salty foam under its bow,
slicing fast through sun breaks and shadow
while you get a faint whiff of neighboring isles,
seeing that great piles of bleached driftwood
seem to form the beach’s necklace,
with the forest as coif,
and kelp as clasp;
your kind of jewelry.

Glenn Buttkus November 2010

Listed as #12 over on Magpie Tales 40

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