Sailboat

1)      You are a regatta in a rainstorm.

All thunderbolts and lifejackets,

you are hell-bent on capsize.

Hulls scream splinters in retort;

Poseidon nods his approval,

you strike worthy in his sight.

But no one cries out to him for aid.

Sometimes waves crest higher than your faith.

2)      My palms are rope-shredded and baby pink.

My fingertips are teeth-tattered, but can still

elicit tones beautiful from string.

Let me sing you complacent.

Calm your ragged breath,

hold your inhale a bit longer.

Fill your lungs to aching with this respite.

3)      An albatross glazes itself like fine pottery across the sky

leaving thirteen years of continuous flight

in his wing-beat-less wake.

He has seen storms like you before

but he long ago molted away his fear of you.

He knows to go over you now.

He knows that flying through you is a death sentence.

4)      The thing about the eye of the storm

is that it’s temporary. And you know

that when this harpy of a hurricane returns
it will be far more destructive than

prior winds could have prepared you for.

If the definition of insanity is repeating the same action and

expecting a different result, then why do I still expect answers

to prayers continually offered in various languages

when my sanity is all I have left.

Yet I continue with my mallet, repairing the gaps

in my storm-stretched framework as though it will make a difference.

5)      Blustering back as though you own

every ocean-bound vessel, your return

is an uneven firefight.

Your winds turn over graves still left

half-buried from your last trip through,

showing no mercy in your swath

of destruction. You target the weak seams first.

Lowering my sails serves to reduce the size of my bulls-eye hide

but your aim is pinpoint. Here’s to hoping

I still know how to shake a bogie.

6)      My father has been teaching me how to sail

since I can remember. We had lessons every Sunday.

His father never taught him much of anything,

so maybe that’s why it’s so hard to let go. 

I need to see him happy before myself.

7)      My shipwreck heart sinks like a sieve

every time I travel through your tempestuous weather.

Your winds blow fiercer than my boats can handle.

But there is enough wood at the bottom of my chest

to construct an armada and I’m still not afraid of your

bluster. You will not beat me. I will sail again.