Oct/Nov 2004 • Poetry |
Shipping News
My plimsoll line is dangerously submerged.
My ballast tanks, in need of dry-dock and, some
might say, emergency repair, see me list more
to starboard than to port.I displace more fluid than before and there's
little doubt that where once my wake was
frigate-like, narrow bowed, fast moving,
my beam is now a tanker.It takes me miles to change direction, I am so
lumbering. Other vessels part to let me pass, afraid
if they don't, I'll drag them under or run aground,
spilling my cargo of crude.