5th August 2022
Applestir breeze, so welcome at the window;
Half-cut moon of earlier
Black down now and humid gone:
Thus, stars startled bright
And planets insistent to brilliant –
What a night for sailing!
Canvassed taut to rigging thrum,
Bow-duffing warm spray aft
As, with compass-glimmered confirmation
And bareback rider’s feel for taking waves,
You knot a confident course
Salt lipped across the bright-with-life mysterious…
As would our gonebefores
Who never oiled a wake bronze of blade, never
Spark-spoiled or smutted out
A Milky Way such as this.
© Christopher Jessop 2022
