This poem is taken from PN Review 207, Volume 39 Number 1, September - October 2012.
Four Poems
Signal Flags
When I think of all the great tall ships -
signals ripping through a red sky -
the tiny men on board and all those lives ended,
and hard lives and short, and some no more than boys,
I am still moved by the beautiful words.
How did the land bear when last seen?
Indicate the bearing of the light.
I am unmanageable.
and
What were your last observations for time?
We are in danger of parting.
And Iago's stage whisper:
Keep a good look out as it is reported that enemy's war vessels
are going about disguised as merchantmen.
The ropes fraying and the flags disordered and sodden and
the slow hoist.
Have you a surgeon?
...
When I think of all the great tall ships -
signals ripping through a red sky -
the tiny men on board and all those lives ended,
and hard lives and short, and some no more than boys,
I am still moved by the beautiful words.
How did the land bear when last seen?
Indicate the bearing of the light.
I am unmanageable.
and
What were your last observations for time?
We are in danger of parting.
And Iago's stage whisper:
Keep a good look out as it is reported that enemy's war vessels
are going about disguised as merchantmen.
The ropes fraying and the flags disordered and sodden and
the slow hoist.
Have you a surgeon?
...
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