From Out of Westport Point
by Richard Dey
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Two & three deep, nudging one another,
squeaking, squealing, creaking,
the gunnel of one riding up over the gunnel of another,
yanking screws, tearing the gunnel fender;
two & three deep, pulling at their painters as the wake
of a passing boat lifts them, quakes
their very dinginess, discombobulates
the pack of them, causing them to smack
one another and generally mash-up,
separating then bringing them back together,
even as wind & tide confuse them, rascals
at bay, the dinghies crowd the dock
waiting purpose, direction
like my dim thoughts first thing each day.
(Copyright © 2015 by Richard Dey)
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Swamped
by Richard Dey
In that position with her decks awash
as if her heart were broken, she has no name
nor class. When did she last hear “Hard-
a-lee!”? What owner would his charge so disclaim?
The jib flies shredded, the main with but one stop.
Rudder, tiller, paddle—these are missing;
bucket, sponge, floor boards, a cap,
& sheets uncoiled are all that’s left for stealing.
Small miracle she floats upright at all,
tell-tails streaming, mooring pennant secure,
that vandals have not looted her
or trucked her in the night to Mackinaw.
Isn’t it odd that boatyard workers don’t care,
that sailors passing, pass by & stare?
(Copyright © 2015 by Richard Dey)
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It’s not supposed to be this way, of course.
You figure home by five before the wind
lets go, the gnats arrive. But you sailed further than
you’d planned & now it’s late, the tide outgoing.
At first you managed in the dying air
by shifting your weight & shifting without motion,
keeping a lee bow, staying outside
the wind shadow, working the eddies.
You skimmed the squiggle with an inch to spare
only to find, and with the mooring in sight,
the wind had died. Died. Not a breath of air.
You were becalmed, fit to be tied. And thirsty!
The boat was going backwards. Anchoring
would get you nowhere. What to do?
Not for nothing do you store a paddle.
But paddling a sailboat is like pushing
a Lincoln Continental out of gas,
your shoulder to the door frame & hand on the wheel.
You huff & puff & curse but don’t give up,
fueled by what you saw, or thought you knew:
not Paradise Island but a New Atlantis
looming in the haze like Vegas in
the desert or Dubai on shifting sands,
immortal on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge;
where along wide palm-lined avenues
fragrant with frangipani Trade Wind swept,
rise skyscrapers of luminous design,
each balcony a garden turning with
the sun & gardeners,
the men & women
in their dark moods & bright, turning with them,
one with the surrounding land & sea;
where poets stand among the senators,
brokering bills for beauty & transcendence,
and there is wealth for all & love without
borders, & a T-wharf hosting spaceships . . .
Even now, paddling for all you’re worth,
salt stings your eyes, blinking with Atlantis.
But on the porch you’ll drink with friends and laugh
and say, Oh, it was just one of those days.
(Copyright © 2015 by Richard Dey)
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The autumn day was fair, the wind nor’west,
the tide high & falling, and we—the boat
and I—were tacking smartly across the channel,
north toward home, when the gust struck.
It was like other gusts—you could see it coming—
it did not look like a gleam in Neptune’s eye.
The boat was beamy, stiff, a stable platform,
and I was hiked out way to windward, sure
of my sense for the wind’s weight, the hull’s hold.
To spill the wind I did not slack the sheet
until—up, up, and O–VER—it was too late
and there to leeward, was my pride awash
in a Hell’s tangle of lines & spars & cloth,
and the boat disgusted, saying “I told you so!”
(Copyright © 2015 by Richard Dey)
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A pram, she was some sweet to row
it was good to go between
the dock & boat in her
but you didn’t have to be going anywhere
to enjoy her, you could just row
or maneuver her
the better to position her
at the still point between
forward & back
or you could idle
with the oars upraised
their wet blades gleaming in the warm sun
At day’s end, you pulled her up
& overturned her on the float
tying the painter to a ring
and when you walked away from her
& saw two red flags flat-out
against the sky lowering
heard their snapping
you knew what it was
you wanted never to lose
(Copyright © 2015 by Richard Dey)
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No one was in the office when I went to ask after
boats like her, which had been built there decades ago,
so I went for a walk around the boatyard,
between Tripps’ sheds and behind them,
to the backside of the dunes and it was there I saw her,
abandoned, in the sand and scrub,
like a skeleton surfaced in its grave.
I couldn’t believe my luck.
I had come to Westport to meet someone
who’d written about these skiffs,
smaller, recreational versions of work skiffs
used on the river for quahoging and scalloping.
Easy and cheap to build, these 12-footers
were flat-bottomed, with an unstayed cat rig
and leg-o’-mutton sail, and safe as a Schwinn.
“She’s yours for the taking,” a Tripp said
when finally I found a Tripp,
“else she’s bound for the dumpster.”
Even as she was, derelict, you could see her sweet sheer,
and how could I let her die in a town dump?
After strapping her together,
I loaded the relic into my pickup and headed home
to the marshlands, creeks, and tidal flats of ’Squam
where the skiff, though too far gone
to restore, would find an afterlife.
You won’t want to hear the details about
how I took her measurements, took her apart,
made patterns from her every piece,
then built new strakes, frames, stem, transom . . .
Of course I did some things differently—
the fastenings are bronze, not galvanized.
She’s a delight to sail, as my kids now know,
besting the channel tide in an eddy, skimming
over the marsh on a falling tide
with the wind astern and a song in her strakes.
Being six feet four and fifty pounds heavier
than the skiff, well . . . I take my chances
in something of a different sort.
(Copyright © 2015 by Richard Dey)
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Columbus Day has come & gone
& Ishmael is Ichabod again
The harbor hangs on the winter wall
like a cupboard empty except for
the sloop set for a dash to Martinique
the ketch poised for the Panama Canal
a sportfisherman shortly to sprint for the Keys
a schooner not to be left behind
And come Xmas, the New Year
where will they be, the boats
& their owners who can’t afford the premiums
or don’t believe in them—
which where they were, safe
& which on the beach, frames caved in
& which at sea, lost
& which tied up to a palm tree?
(Copyright © 2015 by Richard Dey)
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Oak or pine & six feet long,
four-by-four inches square,
pressure-treated, through-bolted hung,
replacing summer’s plastic spheres,
spars mark the moorings—radiators
or engine blocks, mushroom anchors,
rocks, a bathtub filled with cement,
the coffin of an undead parent.
Heavy chain connects them, nothing
ice or hunger or a grudge
could cut, saw, gnaw, or budge.
Barnacles to their links are clinging.
Athwart the wind, against the tide
that toys with them, they ride, they ride.
(Copyright © 2015 by Richard Dey)
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