24 December 2023

By Philip Kuepper

The decks of the wrecked boat were wreaked
with decay.
Termites feasted.
Rats nested.
Birds used them
as perches and springboards
to flight. The boat, itself,
possessed the properties of salvage.
There still was good wood about it.
And about it hung
stories of voyages,
like moths fluttering about the light of memory.
The boat was an old smack
that had fished hard the waters,
a smack that had brought home catch.
It had fed generations.
It had blest, with fish, tables
Lent, Easter, Christmas.
It was a smack that had sated hungers.
Now, it lay a wreck.
Use and storms had caught up with it.
But the water in which it lay
stroked it as though
it was a loved pet, unwell.
The water was loyal.
The water was there for it,
the water and the boat,
a story, interwoven,
of love, a moth
of memory.

(17 December 2023)