I've finished life's chores assigned to me,
So put me on a boat headed out to sea.
Please send along my fishing pole
For I've been invited to the fishin' hole.
Where every day is a day to fish,
To fill your heart with every wish.
Don't worry, or feel sad for me,
I'm fishin' with the Master of the sea.
......
By the old Moulmein Pagoda, lookin' eastward to the sea,
There's a Burma girl a-settin', and I know she thinks o' me;
For the wind is in the palm-trees, and the temple-bells they say:
"Come you back, you British soldier; come you back to Mandalay!"
Come you back to Mandalay,
Where the old Flotilla lay:
Can't you 'ear their paddles chunkin' from Rangoon to Mandalay?
On the road to Mandalay,
Where the flyin'-fishes play,
An' the dawn comes up like thunder outer China 'crost the Bay!
......
Secret they are, sealed, annealed, and brainless
And solitary as Dickens said, but
They have something to say: that there is more
Than one way to yield. The first—and the hardest.
The most nearly hindered—is when you pull
Them off the rocks, a stinking, sawing sedge
Sucking them back under the black mud, full
Of hermit crabs and their borrowed snailshells,
Minnows scattering like superstitions,
The surf dragging, and every power
......
The sea took pity: it interposed with doom:
‘I have tall daughters dear that heed my hand:
Let Winter wed one, sow them in her womb,
And she shall child them on the New-world strand.’
. . . . . . . .
And God stepped out on space,
And he looked around and said:
I'm lonely--
I'll make me a world.
And far as the eye of God could see
Darkness covered everything,
Blacker than a hundred midnights
Down in a cypress swamp.
......
Scarlet sun peeks through
a slit in darkling storm clouds.
Butterflies go home.
Sky meets sea at plum border
as pink moon trails, in order.
Sea are you like a Creek?
Or are you more like a Flood?
Don’t worry I'll tell thee
you’re much like humankind
childlike like a Creek you start
come the dark times and into a flood you grow up
A Flood that seems to swallow everything whole
Ferocious and evil you will become
Lose the empathy for nature and all
In twilight's hush, where secrets fade like mist,
The trees recount their tales through rustling leaves,
Each branch a testament, a history kissed,
Yet all around, the silence weaves and weaves.
From crumbled stones, where ancient echoes sleep,
Stray thoughts like fleeting shadows creep and tease,
Minds turned to ponder, where the stillness keeps,
What truth lies buried 'neath the surface ease?
......
Wait
This can't be a mistake
The morning light
Is just too bright
We've overslept
Curled up in bed
Now we must rush
......
The sun is hot
The birds all flock
The boats convene
Revelers serene
The drinks are cool
They make you drool
The wind blows soft
......