THE NAMES OF THE CHARTS - Poem

 

Names on the Charts

 

Our world gets smaller

As we age within it.

That is the only way

I can explain

Your shrinking grounds.

 

There was a time when

Your wee trolling boat

Covered thousands

Of miles in a season.

But not near the end.

 

Your drag became smaller.

The back side of Gravina,

Twenty Fathom Bank,

False Island to Ship Island,

Narrow Point to Ratz Harbor

 

Maybe it was the comfort

Of knowing the fish

Always returned

To the places where you

Had caught them before

 

Maybe it is was knowing

That you could read

The snags along the beach

The landslides pointing

Toward the sudden shallows

 

Easier than your eyes

Could parse the

Shrinking numbers

On the gradually

Disintegrating charts

 

Perhaps like a car

Attuned to its driveway

Your boat just knew

Its way to the grounds

And then home again,

 

Even on the sea

There are the paths

We wear so deeply

That eventually

We cannot escape.

 

 

 

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