The
dark machine shop—silent, sealed, and still.
The
gray horizon barren of its ships.
The
sky devoid of tackle’s tangled spires.
The
vacant wharves and docks, the empty slips.
The
water undisturbed but by the wind.
No halyard's clang or buzz of whirring lines.
The
blackness interrupted only by
Some
buoys and a tavern’s neon signs.
Yet
nothing quite completely put away,
As
if it might be needed yet today.
Sweet,
small resistance to the sweep of fate:
The
things we wait for; and the things that wait.
