May 13th Whitehaven coastguard station
It’s the
disappointment of it all that does it.
Brings me so
low, aggrieved, I fail to rise above it.
It follows
me,
Right
behind, creeping up, scowling at me.
Misery.
I had such
plans when I was but young,
Of fortune,
estate, adventure, notoriety.
But it
follows me
Failure.
Drags me down, claws at me, and I must
Escape.
And I do.
Get away. To false laughter and cheer
The bawdy,
noisy, clamouring voices and gin and beer
And still it
follows me.
And I have
begun, I can’t stop the noise, the ribald jeer.. and then slump.
Despair.
For a day or
two I am changed; I can see clear…
Storms draw
near, weather here... work to do, I have no fear.
Till there
it is, right behind,
Following me,
Ever near.
Coastguard
work is not for a man like me.
It is not my
Station.
I need to
feel the waves and the roll
Of ocean and
yaw.
Not dry
land. Not steady. I am but bored.
Sometimes I
get it terrible bad. And anger sweeps my hand,
The yoke I
wear and I am sore as a bear.
Don’t follow
me!
I should
have been so much more. For sure, but now:
I have no
use.
Do not pity
me. I blame only me. And if not, I’ll be damned.
It follows
me
The cloud;
big dark, stormy grey: cumulo nimbus ay!
It won’t go
away.
These
Whitehaven days have left me half in craze.
I take to
the pipe and the grog. In amaze.
I am no
company.
To any. None
want me here. I am
But hand in
hand with misery and despair
I cannot
escape my useless, lawless fate.
To drown I
begin
In the rum,
beer and the gin.
No comments:
Post a Comment