The True Grandeur of a place
to be experience
must be merged into one’s being.
There is grandeur here
Some may see it,
but never experience it;
Some conquer it,
and think they have merged with it.
Few merge with it
and in the merging,
See, experience,
and conquer it.
The dockside is a quiet place now.
Through the veil of cloud,
No moon or stars can break.
The dominion of the night has been broken.
No moon or stars can shine.
Though harbor lights and the town’s behind,
They shine
The faint bustle of the town is heard.
It is distant.
The bustle of a town is so far away.
I cannot comprehend the melding of the two.
Though this harbor is the town’s backbone
The harbor now sleeps.
Glass-like water reflects the lights of the town.
I hear the sounds.
But louder are the gentle lapping waves upon this boat;
The faintly clanging halyards in the breeze;
Clanging their percussive symphony.
Voices sometimes break the silence.
My own voice, too,
As I sing to myself, and the sea.
Singing songs of peace, and songs of the sea,
Songs of the life I would lead.
Sleeping harbor, your quietude fills me.
Sleeping harbor, you harbor me.
Oh for the setting sun on the sea,
Oh for the life the sailor does lead,
Traversing the seas and riding the waves
Pushed onward and forward by the force of the trades.
Ah yes, the life of a sailor at sea;
Where any sailor worth his salt yearns to be.
Traversing the seas and riding the waves
Pushed onward and forward by the force of the trades.
Many a salty heart for the ocean does yearn,
Only to be happy when land recedes off the stern,
As he traverses the sea and rides the waves,
Pushed onward and forward by the force of the trades.
Tho’ a romance or two may distract for a while,
The sailor’s heart is filled with sea’s calls,
To be true to his heart he must answer them all
‘Pon a ship bound for somewhere other than where she now lay.
So as any sailor ‘ll tell you the sea alone is the one
To whom he is true and through whom he is one
When true to his heart, he answers the call
Sailing a ship bound for somewhere other than where she now lay.
Set this down, this foot upon land,
that I may be led to wander,
that I may be.
I have no more set my foot
In this land,
Than I have set my heart in the sky.
I would die.
But for the flowers,
oceans, the seas;
The love of nature.
The nature that is all beings.
The nature that is the self.
This I have seen.
This I am.
I have not wandered upon this land,
Though my heart has foundered upon
The edge of this world.
This continent.
This universe.
Longing for other universes, I
have wandered over sky and sea,
O’er plains,
fields,
Yet I have not wandered.
I have stumbled.
Only by chance do I stumble
here,
where a tree stands, and
the hills roll gently into
a distance.
Only by chance, do these things mean anything
to me.
We had come a long way together,
This boat and I.
She was tired.
She had worked hard,
beating across the Pacific,
pounding through waves,
leaning with the puffs,
standing up, waiting for wind.
She had brought us here.
We had worked hard too.
We had kept her going,
kept her pointed the right way.
We were tired too.
We loved our lady.
As I scratched and soothed
the salt from her back,
She loved me too.
As long as there’s
a boat to love,
an ocean to sail,
and wind to blow,
I’ll always have
a place to go,
A boat to sail,
and an ocean to love.
One thing lone ocean travelers know
Is the compelling call of the sea
A call that must be heeded,
That the called must respond to,
The call of the wide blue sea.
But those who’re called and answer
Who venture forth on the sea,
Are called by a love
A compelling need
A need to be at one with the sea.
But something the lone ocean traveler
Would never tell you, be it known,
Is that there is another call
A call coming from the land,
A call to return home.
There is in every sailor’s heart
A port that he calls home;
A port that remains etched in memory,
No matter how far or wide he should roam.
He knows the leading lights so well,
He knows the fog horn’s moan;
He knows the shifting sands of the bar;
He knows that port called home.
It’s where as a boy he would walk the docks,
Alone on a Saturday,
Admiring the boats and yachts and ships
That he aspired to sail.
It’s where by the water’s edge he would sit
And for hours stare out to sea,
Dreaming of the time that would one day come
When on the ocean he’d be set free.
It’s where that fateful day did come
When the first time the bar he crossed,
And leaving land’s turmoil behind in the wake,
He knew to the sea his life would be lost.
Every sailor has a port called home;
For which a part of his heart still yearns.
That he remembers and loves and always knows
One day he will return.
Some sail back on the ebbing tide
Aboard the ship of their dreams;
Bearing the fruits of their voyages so long,
And a bond with the sea so real.
Others sail back on ships of the night,
When their ships have gone down in tragedy,
For though departed now from the sailor’s life,
‘Twas a life filled with love for the sea.
Even the ocean-faring sailor’s departed soul
Cannot rest in peace in the sea, or above,
So every sailor must return, living or not,
To that port he calls home–he loves.
Once, alone,
Upon a wide wide sea I went.
In touch with my self;
the sea;
In touch with every part of me.
Winds were fair and sails full;
Venturing forth I continued on my way.
A journey unencumbered by any crew,
Just myself, the vessel,
and the winds that blew
Steadily out of the west;
And a sun that shone,
and the rolling waves.
The spirit of the sun, the waves,
The sea, my little vessel, and me;
All these spirits coming together,
just for the betterment of me.
It was a spirit’s journey
Where I would find myself
In league with the wind and sea.
In cohorts with a boat
To bring this body to where it’s free:
To take me back to the sea.
A sea I’d known in younger days
(Though never I’d forgotten)
A sea I’d loved, through all of time,
Even though I had gone away
I always knew I’d return.
Onward, into the blue
Towards an Island that I knew
would be my refuge, my haven,
My home on the sea.
Towards an Island where I could find me.
Passing through the wide blue sea
Not a human soul to distract me,
Nor a boon companion to comfort me,
save the roll of the waves
and the wind moving on,
Yet accompanied I always was.
A lone lost tern did visit me.
Setting down in the water where
I could see, a fellow traveler,
alone on the sea.
A pelagic soul, just like me.
Overhead that little bird’s mates did fly.
After his visit with me,
A glance and a squawk for a good-bye,
He joined his flock again.
My flock lies waiting back on land,
Where my parting glance
could not hide
an eagerness, untold,
Or a respectful fear,
For the sea was all I needed.
And like the bird,
A pelagic soul,
I know to my flock I’ll return.
This is a solemn place
This is a painful place
A place of sorrow
A place that’s filled with life;
In life there is reason
In reason is belief;
Belief in reason is not enough.
To assuage the pain of a solemn place
To apologize for sorrow of
a reasonable place;
To reason the belief in reason.
![[x]](https://smpoetry.amigotico.com/wp-content/themes/mad-meg/images/rss.png "Syndicate this site using RSS")