The Wild, Wild Sea

(For Dad)

I saw it again this evening,
A black sail in a pale yellow sky.
And just as before in a moment,
It was gone where the grey gulls fly.

If it should happen again I shall worry
That only a strange ship could fly,
And my sanity scans the horizon
In the light of a darkening sky.

That night as I walked in my slumber
I waded into the sea strand,
And I swam with the moon and her lover
Until I lost sight of the land.

I swam 'till the night became morning
A black sea in the reddening sky.
Found myself on the deck on a rolling ship,
So far where no grey gulls fly.

All around me was silence
As if mocking my frail human hopes.
And a question mark hung in the canvas
For the wind that had died in the ropes.

I may have slept for an hour,
I may have slept for a day
For a woke in a bed of white linen
And the sky was the colour of clay.

At first just a rustle of canvas,
And the gentlest breath on my face.
But a galloping line of white horses
Said that soon we were in for a race.

The gentle sigh turned to a howling,
And the grey sky she angered to black,
And my anxious eyes searched the horizon
With the gathering sea at my back.

Did I see the shade of a sailor
On the bridge through the wheelhouse pane?
Held fast to the wheel of the rocking ship
As I squinted my eyes in the rain.

For the ship had turned into the wind,
Against the storm to brace
And underneath the sailor's hat,
I saw my father's face.

If a prayer today is spoken
Please offer it for me
When the bridge to heaven is broken,
And you've lost on the wild wild sea
Lost on the wild wild sea...