The iron schooner broke clean in two...and the waves

rushed over her stern which sank like lead into the sand.

Truro, December 5, 1893

It’s little he knew or thought

he knew, there in the sand

stumbling, hardly upright,

the sea still in him, her wrack

and swell. On all fours,

recollecting the din in

the rigging: the audible

crack as the keel split.

Heart astonished

by its permeable borders,

the livingness beyond air.

The others gone under.

They hadn’t his luck.

Was it the bale of jute

or the sleek bob of a seal’s

head that righted his way?

Surely, some supernal

rhythm fixed his course

He washed up on shingle,

frozen, bleary with sleet.

White as clouds, the lost souls flew.

For weeks he heard it, a terrible

slatting of sails on spars—

Nothing stopped it, only

the rhythm of hooves,

the Truro milk horse, tin-shake

of harness as he stepped out

into the yard and the mare

lowered her craggy head.

He smoothed the length

of her ears, forefinger to thumb,

and there, at his chest, the blow

of her breath, familiar, warm.