Page 28 - flying stones

the tide is out

the tide is out. moored boats

sprawl on barren rippled sand
across the Gloucester inlet

abandoned like uncoupled amusement rides.

if you are patient, you will see

an 87-year-old Portuguese fisherman

climb into a beaten longboat.
you will notice the thickened skin

of his face, his forehead. the corners of his eyes,

are gouged with cracks that fork like tree branches.
his hair is an untrimmed shrub of grey strands.

his eyebrows dangle like vines over his pupils
clouded with cataracts from the sun:

portals that have leaked and corroded with dried salt.

if you could look down on this weary man,

you would think you were miles above a vast desert.

when the ocean withdrew in repeated laps, it left its
signature of parallel ripples on the drying surface.

only small rivulets cross these miniature dunes as would
Desert Horned Vipers, side-winding on the Sahara.

the fisherman is resolute. his boots cling, rooted
to the hull of the vessel of the only work he has known

since his youth. they will not let this tree of a man

go out to sea again, except in spirit.