Scrimshander

My sole employment is, and scrupulous care,
To place my going beyond the reach of tides
Each smoother pebble and each shell more rare,
Which Ocean kindly to my hand confides.
-- Henry David Thoreau

More than affinity, yet by accident,
The salt in our blood is of a seaborne
Pulse. We ceaselessly rise again
With the moonlit tide, but fall off
With barometric pressure. And we dare
To sail through another’s song,
The scent of the sea, of wet oak and pine,
Of asphalt and festering dulse. Long
Our mal de mer may be forgotten, but beware,
My sole employment is and scrupulous care
Polishing rejected sea relics
Of bone and ivory, tooth, and tusk,
Brined in memory and sand,
Home to worm and becalmed
By impractical eyes --
Remarking on many sides
The flights of flying fish, the passage
Of clippers by night or day,
Etched into drama of whale and docksides
To place my gains beyond the reach of tides.
Before the fading light I turn
The baleen and tusk of walrus, and stare
Unblinking beyond the candle flame
Grasping an image from memory.
Carved upon haft of bowie blade
Or ivory bean or button to wear,
Blue water sailing on a miniature sea --
Full-blown gale in a rum bottle,
A sea-rapture in each sculpted tear
Each smoother pebble and each shell more rare.

As a poet-artist Edward Baranosky crosses the channels and pathways between the visual and the textual. Published in Eastern Structures, Haiku Avenue, Lynx Journal, Northern New England Review, among others. At 79, he has no full collection, is still emerging. He currently lives in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.