Free verse № 148878
Wreck of the Poor Anchor
(In 2075 a deep probe
assembles sensor data,
beams murky images,
and builds a story from intelligence,
no longer artificial.)
It began in the village of Dover
where a pier extends, called London.
A species of ground squirrels,
plentiful in the region,
lent fleas to the local rats.
As for the rats, they subsisted,
in houses along the shore,
in and out of schooners along the quay.
not often seen by dayâ
âThe cats kill them,â said the sailors,
âor the rat-catcher does,â
and the schooners sailed rat-free.
But by night, along the wharf, rats waited,
gamboled in the warehouses,
perched on pilings, watching.
When the Poor Anchor came from San Jose
and moored at the London pier,
a thousand small, glinty eyes
glowed among the shore.
As a matter of routine, and to impress the locals,
the crew put shields along the hawsers,
but did not take up the gang plank at night,
and now and then a rat slithered on
to find a gluttonâs fare.
The rats were glad aboard the ship,
each female birthing a hundred, maybe more,
offspring every year.
Having fired the rat-catcher, a year and a half before,
the Poor Anchor sailed amiably from Dover
for home, and from the broad Pacific came a cable
announcing members of the crew had died,
had died of plague.
And to the world of seamen
the curt message spread
with bone-scorching fire,
âBeware the Poor Anchor,
wantonly childish, doomed.â
Even her crew abandoned ship,
fled to shore or safer craft.
So drifting alone, Poor Anchor sank,
while fatted rats
gasped in the open sea.
33 comments
Womens, on the other hand, should have pure, delicate features, unsullied by the loss of innocence which comes facial hairs and the capacity for rational thought.
http://www.weebls-stuff.com/wab/pieku/
I think part of the problem may be that there's no one to connect with--if you read, for example, Zodiac's poem about Cook dying, it's the people in the poem that really make it work; we identify with the dying Captain, the native girl. This lacks any such personalization/identification. Even something like "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" connects us with the ship by making it something living--maybe it's the focus on the rats that doesn't work for me here. The prologue seems unnecessary, tacked on; doesn't advance anything, IMO, and isn't really ever followed up in any way. In general, too, this gets a little too anthropormorphic for me (the glad rats, the amiably sailing ship).
I think the story telling is pretty good, though could use some paring. And I like the last line--the "fatted rats" suggesting, intentionally or not, fatted calves (a sacrifice) and "gasping in the open sea" is a good line and image.
I love the "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" and would love to write a ballad form like it, but first Iâd want something serious to write about, second more talent. And youâre right, it relates more to rats than people, unlike Zodiacâs Valentine 2 (about Captain Cook) a good poem on a serious subject.
The prologue could be dumped. Itâs supposed to show that what we now call artificial intelligence might, in 2075, be smart enough to decipher whatâs really going on.
Sorry itâs too anthropomorphic, with glad rats, amiable ship and all â just part of the silliness. Thanks for the helpful comment.
I used to go to a place on the Upper West Side called Indus or Indus Valley, or something like that, that was around 98th or 99th and B'way--was very good and relatively inexpensive. No monkey egg specials though.
As always, your logic is impeccable. ;)
Drapes in a crate; it sounds, well, NESTlike.
Hope you enjoy your time in NYC.
Log in to add a comment.