Care To Be Out at a Sea? ‘Old men ought to be explorers’ T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets Come hang a shore O land lover come with me you who are fastened at the feet you who are stiff in your skin Come with me, sail with me, the wind sail being drawn tide rising and falling deep waters telling more than of their rise and fall on the lands edge calling out to the comic tragic coward's home Come with me you who are tired whose feet are heavy numb and sore Come with me onto the waters of life the raging waters of the fluid pattern The danger, yes, it awaits you the rain cloud lined with gold the winter wind chilling loved ones' faces battling the wind the raging wind trudging through deep snow in search of love Come with me side by side without holding hands not my hand and not yours not in each other but of each other into emptiness unfolding and we creating Refuge? If I were a butterfly how high I would fly fluttering my vibrant colours If I were a snail how slowly I would sludge sludge sludge through the grass butterfly or snail? which shall I be? is my flesh so soft my will so weak (this life, the life of choice) that such creatures offer a refuge? Do I Fear? Do I fear that you might stay that you might go, forever? Yes, O unknowable other flaming glory of tomorrow Yes, with all my life, my little life this I fear the most with all my fear, with all of me Nothing left unused in my fearing all of me waiting in fear for the arrival that does not leave that can not leave that has left that only arrives forever arriving filling me, filling all of me nothing left to be filled but all of me being filled, being just being Back to Poetry Index