journey

I be a common salty, once,
No captain's bars, did bear,
Yet blessed was I to venture,
Where few a skipper dared.
~
From steadfast crow's high perch
I watched the bright coast beacons wink,
Through a biting spray's December gale,
What goring shoals would sink.
~
For untold days I rocked atop
An oaken spar at length,
While wake and skies conveyed my eyes,
Lord Neptune's sullen strength.
~
Busy dogs, the mates and jacks
Bent hard to tasks below,
While toward the sky, with glass to eye,
My post waved to-and-fro.
~
First was I to e'er spot land,
My voice the first to yell,
Aye, first to sight the skull and bone,
And raise the warning bell.
~
"Thar she blows!" was oft my call
If viewed a breach, had I,
And "Friend or foe?!?" the question barked,
If strange sails split the sky.
~
But the moments that becalmed my soul,
As the swells ticked off my time,
Were star-filled nights, a bullion moon,
And the phosphorescent brine.
~
The darkest times were battlements,
When the ship groaned in its might,
But never dark, the eventide,
Sea and sky awash with light!
~
So rare, it was, to find this tar
On deck or down below,
And rarer still, did I abdicate,
My nest there in the crow.
~
Well, I'm adrift on shore now,
With brittle bones and gray,
Yet still my mind climbs up the mast,
To man my post and sway.
~
And when the gods task me,
To a new and heavenly crow,
I'll bend my gaze to the looking glass,
And give a hearty "Tally-ho!"
 

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