The voyage, now, is at an end.
The anchors have been cast.
The fleet bobs silently offshore,
looking boundlessly vast.
For fog has settled on the bay
and ship shapes fade to gray.
They count themselves infinite ships
while bounded by that bay.
The sea deceives, that much is true;
the rest we’ve yet to know.
Some will swear that trawlers sit there
that were lost long ago.
shore wash:
chasing, and chased by,
tiny feet
crab sand art
alien beach language
’til high tide
dark clouds.
fishing boats race
churning seas
spiked urchin
wedged amid the rocks,
step wisely
low tide
glass sea stretches to
the breakers
Taken in December of 2018 on Havelock Island (Swaraj Dweep)
liquid metal
shape-shifting silver seas
ribbed and rippling
tiny crabs
writing alien script
high tides erase
turquoise water
bound by brown patches
a tidal maze
tiny limpid fish
braver than your bigger peers
drifting as they dart
tsunami swamped
moments under water
forever changed
Will those trawlers haul their nets through the night,
even after darkness has descended?
When clustered stars offer the only light,
and the land-locked day has long since ended?
Are fishing vessels like the dreaded shark,
that swims endlessly when wetted by sea?
No mourning nor merriment owed the dark,
and miles between the hull and the quay.
They persistently glide on ocean tides,
measuring time by space left in the hold.
There’s a secret some sailors will confide,
each outing ends in a death unforetold.
There is the pleasant death of days at rest,
but then there’s becoming Poseidon’s guest.
Low Tide; Taken in December of 2017 in San Juan on Siquijor Island
The river twists through a barren landscape.
Filling with flotsam, detritus, and silt,
dragging death downstream,
it will pour into a bright, blue sea.
You should savor that scene,
but your view is from above,
and so you see a shit-colored plume
splaying into the clear, calm waters.
And you fear the shit stain
will spread across the sea.
But it doesn’t.
It seems to settle.
You never knew the clear and calm could
subdue those murky, mucky waters.
Taken on January 1, 2016 on Bai Tu Long Bay
Bai Tu Long Bay is the lesser known–but geographically larger–sibling of Ha Long Bay. It’s name refers to baby dragons, and it derives from the same myth from which Ha Long got its name (i.e. “Descending Dragon.”) Like Ha Long it’s considered a scenic wonder because of the skerries jutting up out of the sea.
We were told that we got a lucky break in getting a clean sunrise during our visit because it’s usually overcast. (Our tour straddled New Years.) It was overcast almost the whole time, but I tend to be skeptical of people selling an experience.
