Storm at Sausalito
Sailboats lashed to the pier,
ebon masts, dark trees bare
with tightly shrouded canvas sail,
rigging singing in the gale,
pier groaning, grey waves grind
clinging sloops to taut lines,
steel bulwarks rise and fall
against gleaming, cool jetty walls.
poem by Steven Federle
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Sensual Sea
Sensual Sea
I have spent some time over the sensual sea
No longer there still I hear, ' come flow with me '
Leaving a pier at dark sailing into the night
On and on we sail under the magic of moonlight
I feel that in another life I was one with the sea
Meant to be on a tall ship swaying endlessly
Gliding along under sail on a sea that sings
Creaking masts send us forth on our billowy wings
Nothing can compare to sailing neath stars above
Exciting places to be seen while on this sea of love
Someday I shall return and sail again upon this sea
Wouldn't you like to leave this land and sail away with me?
Jim 1999
poem by James Casey
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Linda
Seven ships without a sail
Seven cats without a tail
Boy, its weird here
On this spooky old pier tonight
But Im not frightened 'cause I know what it is
Evrything is just the same as it was
Im in trouble because of linda
She hurt me so badly
She said shed be here
On our special pier
I lover her
Linda, the carousels playing
But that merry-go-round
Is bringing me down
'cause I remember what it meant to you
Linda, linda
I love you
song performed by by Randy Newman
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Graceful Pillar
Grace has a pillar of obvious concentration,
Of stone it is built, of a soul and mind it stored.
Grace may live among houses
Where the pier of gratitude is,
Everywhere goes the sea of thankful grace.
Grace has a stationary title of sun and star,
Of goggles the eyes of grace do speak,
Hated is a craving for height, of weight, of general size.
Grace may be open like a shop,
Or the pier of handsome repose is taken by waves
To be eroded and expelled from the land and sea.
poem by Naveed Akram
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Rockport...Visual Imagery
Pea green sea squalls,
Whorled out of a Nor’easter
Ping with the sting of the ocean’s spray.
Wind roped ocean waves
Lope, in the wind sail gales,
The chilled cheeks of my taut face,
Shouting windward and away...
Far up the winding slate rock walls of the jetty;
The wreckage of a whaler, among white caps
And Narwhale bones.
The bowsprit of the sea,
Rises like a fish tale out of the coast:
The imagined mermaid of the manatae...
John Thomas Tansey 6/02
poem by John Tansey
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Sad Moonlit Night
Drat that snatch-thief dog,
He howls at the moon from the rotting pier.
When the soul pricks up its ears,
It hears the shrill girls choiring,
Choiring
With their gloomy voices,
By the somber stone wall out at the pier.
Why is it always this way
with me?
Listen, you dog, you.
Tell me, you pale-blue, unhappy dog, you.
poem by Sakutaro Hagiwara
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It Blows A Snowing Gale
IT blows a snowing gale in the winter of the year;
The boats are on the sea and the crews are on the pier.
The needle of the vane, it is veering to and fro,
A flash of sun is on the veering of the vane.
Autumn leaves and rain,
The passion of the gale.
poem by Robert Louis Stevenson
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Thorkild’s Song
There´s no wind along these seas,
Out oars for Stavanger!
Forward all for Stavanger!
So we must wake the white-ash breeze.
Let fall for Stavanger!
A long pull for Stavanger!
Oh, hear the benches creak and strain!
(A long pull for Stavanger!)
She thinks she smells the Northland rain!
(A long pull for Stavanger !)
She thinks she smells the Northland snow,
And she's as glad as we to go.
She thinks she smells the Northland rime,
And the dear dark nights of winter-time.
She wants to be at her own home pier,
To shift her sails and standing gear.
She wants to be in her winter-shed,
To strip herself and go to bed.
Her very bolts are sick for shore,
And we—we want it ten times more!
So all you Gods that love brave men,
Send us a three-reef gale again!
Send us a gale, and watch us come,
With closecropped canvas slashing home!
But—there’s no wind on all these seas,
A long pull for Stavanger!
So we must wake the white-ash breeze,
A long pull for Stavanger!
poem by Rudyard Kipling
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The Thorkild's Song
There's no wind along these seas,
Out oars for Stavenger!
Forward all for Stavenger!
So we must wake the white-ash breeze,
Let fall for Stavenger!
A long pull for Stavenger!
Oh, hear the benches creak and strain!
(A long pull for Stavenger!)
She thinks she smells the Northland rain!
(A long pull for Stavenger!)
She thinks she smells the Northland snow,
And she's as glad as we to go,
She thinks she smells the Northland rime,
And the dear dark nights of winter-time.
She wants to be at her own home pier,
To shift her sails and standing gear.
She wants to be in her winter-shed,
To strip herself and go to bed,
Her very bolts are sick for shore,
And we-we want it ten times more!
So all you Gods that love brave men,
Send us a three-reef gale again!
Send us a gale, and watch us come,
With close-cropped canvas slashing home!
But--there's no wind on all these seas,
A long pull for Stavenger!
So we must wake the white-ash breeze,
A long pull for Stavenger!
poem by Rudyard Kipling
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Rough Saiing
deck rising,
waves tossing
taut life-
lines, cold-
sailing, salt-
air, dark water,
wrenched
by gale, by moon,
by jealous
core
of earth,
but hold firm
flex legs to keep
your balance
your next
breath
exhales life
like wind
roaring with
ex-
hilara-
tion.
poem by Steven Federle
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Off Riviere Du Loup
O ship incoming from the sea
With all your cloudy tower of sail,
Dashing the water to the lee,
And leaning grandly to the gale,
The sunset pageant in the west
Has filled your canvas curves with rose,
And jeweled every toppling crest
That crashes into silver snows!
You know the joy of coming home,
After long leagues to France or Spain
You feel the clear Canadian foam
And the gulf water heave again.
Between these somber purple hills
That cool the sunset's molten bars,
You will go on as the wind wills,
Beneath the river's roof of stars.
You will toss onward toward the lights
That spangle over the lonely pier,
By hamlets glimmering on the heights,
By level islands black and clear.
You will go on beyond the tide,
Through brimming plains of olive sedge,
Through paler shadows light and wide,
The rapids piled along the ledge.
At evening off some reedy bay
You will swing slowly on your chain,
And catch the scent of dewy hay,
Soft blowing from the pleasant plain.
poem by Duncan Campbell Scott
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Through Time and Bitter Distance
Unknown to you, I walk the cheerless shore.
The cutting blast, the hurl of biting brine
May freeze, and still, and bind the waves at war,
Ere you will ever know, O! Heart of mine,
That I have sought, reflected in the blue
Of these sea depths, some shadow of your eyes;
Have hoped the laughing waves would sing of you,
But this is all my starving sight descries-
I
Far out at sea a sail
Bends to the freshening breeze,
Yields to the rising gale
That sweeps the seas;
II
Yields, as a bird wind-tossed,
To saltish waves that fling
Their spray, whose rime and frost
Like crystals cling
III
To canvas, mast and spar,
Till, gleaming like a gem,
She sinks beyond the far
Horizon's hem.
IV
Lost to my longing sight,
And nothing left to me
Save an oncoming night,-
An empty sea.
poem by Emily Pauline Johnson
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The Rising Of The Storm
THE lake's dark breast
Is all unrest,
It heaves with a sob and a sigh.
Like a tremulous bird,
From its slumber stirred,
The moon is a-tilt in the sky.
From the silent deep
The waters sweep,
But faint on the cold white stones,
And the wavelets fly
With a plaintive cry
O'er the old earth's bare, bleak bones.
And the spray upsprings
On its ghost-white wings,
And tosses a kiss at the stars;
While a water-sprite,
In sea-pearls dight,
Hums a sea-hymn's solemn bars.
Far out in the night,
On the wavering sight
I see a dark hull loom;
And its light on high,
Like a Cyclops' eye,
Shines out through the mist and gloom.
Now the winds well up
From the earth's deep cup,
And fall on the sea and shore,
And against the pier
The waters rear
And break with a sullen roar.
Up comes the gale,
And the mist-wrought veil
Gives way to the lightning's glare,
And the cloud-drifts fall,
A sombre pall,
O'er water, earth, and air.
The storm-king flies,
His whip he plies,
And bellows down the wind.
The lightning rash
With blinding flash
Comes pricking on behind.
Rise, waters, rise,
And taunt the skies
With your swift-flitting form.
Sweep, wild winds, sweep,
And tear the deep
To atoms in the storm.
And the waters leapt,
And the wild winds swept,
And blew out the moon in the sky,
And I laughed with glee,
It was joy to me
As the storm went raging by!
poem by Paul Laurence Dunbar
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The Call of the Bush
Three roads there are that climb and wind
Amongst the hills, and leave behind
The patterned orchards, sloping down
To meet a little country town.
And of these roads I'll take the one
That tops the ridges, where the sun
Is tempered by the mountain-breeze
And dancing shadows of the trees.
The road is rough - but to my feet
Softer than is the city street;
And then the trees! - how beautiful
She-oak and gum - how fresh and cool!
No walls there are to hamper me;
Only in blue infinity
The distant mountain-ramparts rise
Beneath the broad arch of the skies.
And in that high place I shall hear
The wild birds' singing, soft and clear;
And horse-bells tinkling as of old
In amongst the wattles' gold
Far-off is the ocean tide;
But there across the country-side
Roll waves of bush that rise and fall
To break against the mountain-wall.
And every little farm is seen
An island in a sea of green;
And every little farm at night
Flings through the dark its beacon-light -
There in the silence of the hills,
I shall find peace that soothes and stills
The throbbing of the weary brain, -
For I am going home again.
poem by Dora Wilcox
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Grind
Grind, Grind, Grind, Grind, Grind, Grind, Grind
I can bend in sixty-eight ways
I have lived for twelve thousand days
Twenty-eight teeth inside my head
Grind three types of things and I'm sad that they're dead
Grind, Grind, Grind, Grind, Grind, Grind, Grind
song performed by by Phish
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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What Think You I Take My Pen In Hand?
WHAT think you I take my pen in hand to record?
The battle-ship, perfect-model'd, majestic, that I saw pass the
offing to-day under full sail?
The splendors of the past day? Or the splendor of the night that
envelopes me?
Or the vaunted glory and growth of the great city spread around me?--
No;
But I record of two simple men I saw to-day, on the pier, in the
midst of the crowd, parting the parting of dear friends;
The one to remain hung on the other's neck, and passionately kiss'd
him,
While the one to depart, tightly prest the one to remain in his arms.
poem by Walt Whitman
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My Bed Is A Boat
My bed is like a little boat;
Nurse helps me in when I embark;
She girds me in my sailor's coat
And starts me in the dark.
At night I go on board and say
Good-night to all my friends on shore;
I shut my eyes and sail away
And see and hear no more.
And sometimes things to bed I take,
As prudent sailors have to do;
Perhaps a slice of wedding-cake,
Perhaps a toy or two.
All night across the dark we steer;
But when the day returns at last,
Safe in my room beside the pier,
I find my vessel fast.
poem by Robert Louis Stevenson
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My Bed is a Boat
My bed is like a little boat;
Nurse helps me in when I embark;
She girds me in my sailor's coat
And starts me in the dark.
At night I go on board and say
Good-night to all my friends on shore;
I shut my eyes and sail away
And see and hear no more.
And sometimes things to bed I take,
As prudent sailors have to do;
Perhaps a slice of wedding-cake,
Perhaps a toy or two.
All night across the dark we steer;
But when the day returns at last,
Safe in my room beside the pier,
I find my vessel fast.
poem by Robert Louis Stevenson
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Losing Track
Long after you have swung back
away from me
I think you are still with me:
you come in close to the shore
on the tide
and nudge me awake the way
a boat adrift nudges the pier:
am I a pier
half-in half-out of the water?
and in the pleasure of that communion
I lose track,
the moon I watch goes down, the
tide swings you away before
I know I'm
alone again long since,
mud sucking at gray and black
timbers of me,
a light growth of green dreams drying.
poem by Denise Levertov
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Those must be masts of ships the gazer sees
Those must be masts of ships the gazer sees
On through the little gap in the park trees
So far away that seeing almost fails.
Those must be masts, the lovely masts of ships
Stripped bare of sails.
There's nothing here to please the seeing eyes,
Four poles with crossway beams against the skies.
But beauty's not for sight. True beauty sings
Of latent movement to the unsensed soul
In love with wings.
poem by Lesbia Harford
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Cold Sailing
Waves enfold waves.
With rolling swell
we rise and fall.
Through deafening static
of storm-struck air
I hear the rigging’s
ringing fear
as under the bridge
titanic ships
plow darker paths
through
shadowed bay.
With sails engorged,
swiftly
we fly away!
poem by Steven Federle
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