Broken Mooring

One side, two side, horizon of sea and sky, iodine and acetic;

a reeking binary. Three men wheeze

salt in the wind, we see them careening the hull by the gantry

and in turn hear the wet scrape.

The grinder puts it askew, too one-tone on the barnacled

carrier. We watch the boiler suits panic

about their muscles and we compare the harbour-barrier

to one turgid, steely arm.

Hot sparks leap and collide with froth-hazed sea spray

to fuse beautifully, maybe uglier

under the pressure-washer’s charge – if then they lose

us, we watch the former last;

We wonder in coming-and-goings, and lap about the dry-dock

in the comings, and think the goings

come too fast. Or if we, out of synch, could catch the runnings

or if they themselves have passed.

Sluice gates ricochet sounds behind the mainmast we cannot

understand, and the distant thunders

we assume are waves scrabbling at some remote land,

or just some other sound.

Simon Peter Everett, 2009 ©