In the original Rant I included this neat painting by James Christensen of an old man in a sailboat sitting high and dry on a rock beach overlooking the sea. Look online for fantasy pictures by Christensen and you will be delighted. It generated this poem, Give Me The Sea. It is followed by a piece called Dance Me To The End Of Love, inspired by a picture by Jack Vetterino, followed by several poems, MouseGod, Look in my eyes, Remembering a Dream, Had I been wise.
"Oh, I am a cook and a captain bold,
And the mate of the Nancy brig,
And a bo'sun tight, and a midshipmite,
And the crew of the captain's gig!"
Excerpt from The Yarn Of The Nancy Bell by W. S. Gilbert
Give me the Sea
By ldsledge
May 20, 2006
Oh set me afloat
In me friggin’ boat
Upon the foamin’ brine
I’m a mean old coot
And I don’t give a hoot
About your lubber’s whine
I’ll take me tea
Myself and me
And what I say is true
I’ll sail away
One fine day
Onto the salty blue
Meanwhile I’ll wait
In this landed state
To take me for me ride
I really hate
This landlubber fate
I pray for an early tide
When I die
I pray that I
Will swim with Davy Jones
In the deep
Is the place to keep
Me remaining mortal bones
Soon far out upon the sea
All that you will see of me
Will be a tiny speck of sail
Then I’ll be home
The world to roam
With the porpoise and the whale
So kiss it while you may me lass
The time is now and soon will pass
I feel me tide a risin’
A mariner man will come and go
And dock his dingy with the flow
As you soon will be realizin’
I may be old
but I’ve been told
I’ve wood a plenty for the fire
We’ve got time
For a lovely rhyme
I promise to inspire.
I’ll be gone with the swellin’ sea
But you haven’t seen the last of me
This voyage has just begun
In the topsail I’ll be singin’
In the wind I’ll be a wingin’
Look for me beyond the sun
By L D Sledge, May 20, 2006
Today is Saturday, May 20, 2006. We have had another fantastic morning, portending a fine warm day, but not too hot as of yet here in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
I am a fan of fantasy art, and James Christensen is one of my favorites. That is one of his odd little paintings above that inspired the poem. You can go online and Google, or Ask, or whatever search engine, and look under fantasy art and there are wonderful artists in there you can click on and save for your screensaver or wallpaper. Several years ago I printed out perhaps thirty or forty glossy pictures and wrote a little short story about the picture and printed it on the back. I then sent the collection to my grandchildren Jeffery, Austin and Krystalin in Houston. I like to take a picture and write a story about it as an exercise. There’s an artist, Jack Vettriano, who didn’t do fantasy but it was borderline---. He did pictures that were evidently set in the twenties, beach scenes of slim ladies in gowns dancing on the strand with a trim man in a tux or evening clothes, while a servant held an umbrella over them.
I wrote this about the elegant couple, dancing on the hard sand of a beach where the tide had just receded. They looked like a couple that F. Scott Fitzgerald would write about, the idle rich, their mansion just on the rise behind me, with their butler in his tux holding the umbrella so they wouldn’t be wet by any soft rain that may fall in from sparse evening clouds.
Dance With Me To The End Of Love
It was 1929, and all was well. Our villa on the cape overlooked the sea, and we would dance on the strand in the evening. I would wear my tuxedo and Olympia would wear her gossamer gown of silvery silk that clung to her lithe body with every move. We would tango to a rhythm only she and I could hear, her body pressing hard against me, whispering, her breath spasms of pleasure, her lips brushing my face, her perfumed breath intoxicating as we made our quick turn.
The thin light of twilight before the stars, the sand hard on a film of the sea as flat as paper beneath our slippered feet, we would dance the dance of love. My body tense and demanding that she move to my will, her body entwined then freed and entwined again like mating serpents, teaching, then turning away as if in anger, faces taut with pent restraint, building, building to a point of no return.
Olympia. A creature of passion and sensuality. Her flowing hair as black as night, done up in a high bun with gilded chopsticks driven through. Her moist lips glowing crimson against teeth so white and clean I had to curb the urge to plunge my flaming tongue inside to touch them. Her nipples were hard enough to feel through my jacket as she brushed by, her gown drawn hard against her heated body.
She always held her breath as long as she could, as we pulsed to the thumping beat of our tango no one else could hear. The night birds would sometimes swirl around us, as if they heard our music, and wanted to join, but we were alone---the world didn’t exist. Only she existed for me, and me for her. We were the universe, the only universe and I could see or think of nothing else.
That was long ago. Her world swirled away in the crash, and her wealthy family moved to the continent. I stayed on the strand, alone, sometimes dancing in the evening with the terns and gulls, holding her, feeling her press against me, sucking in her breath and holding it, with my eyes closed, re-living the moments, thankful for having know what there is of heaven.
02/04/01 Dance To The End of Love, after looking at the calendar pix by Jack Vetterino.
Wow, as I opened that thick loose leaf binder looking for that little piece above, I found a cache of stuff I had written long ago.
Had I been wise
Oh God, had I been wise
I would not have this measure of experience
Had I been wise
I would be rich and in leisure at this time
Had I been wise
I may have known love
Had I been wise
Would I have done differently?
Had I been wise
I would perhaps not been
The me I am
Had I been wise
I would not have been
As wise as I am now
Had I been wise.
I have pulled the oars in a galley as a slave
I have ridden camels across the waste on the silk road
I have ruled empires as Sheik and Pharaoh
I have marched with Hannibal across the Alps
I have bored skulls in China, as physician to release evil spirits
I have sun the songs that swayed empires, as Solomon, Hing Tsu and Ragga
I have slogged through swamps in search of baubles on Arctuous
I have dealt and died a million deaths
From sword, disease and famine
I have won, lost, laughed, cried and taunted
My enemies, boredom and death
Look in my eyes
You will see eternity.
Remembering a Dream
I danced with her last night
And her skin was smooth,
Drawn over hands
With blue veins
Pretty hands
Now old
Still feeling
Still reaching
Still dancing
Her eyes were blue
I knew she has grandchildren
Who adore her
And her body was solid and firm
From workout and dance
And the life was in her
Like slow fire
It burned
And will burn on and on.
MouseGod
Tiny brown movements
Scuttling in dried grasses
Munching seeds on haunches
“Shadow!”
“Freeze”
Explosion of feathers
Slice of beak and talon
Another sacrifice to the sky God’s wrath.
Hawk Lunch
Eye in the pine top
Sees me Sees all
Launch and soar
Circling
Sleek plunging missile
Exploding talon’s fury
“Yummmmmmm”
Sweet mousie lunch.
I know that some of you say I write too much, well that is too bad. I get a case of mental cramps if I don’t write something every day or so, and Saturday mornings usually yield up a free hour or two to wander about in my mind for something to write about. Maybe my great grandchildren will be grateful for their crazy old grandpop’s meanderings.
Have a fabulous day. Don’t forget to be unserious for a little while. Admire someone. Find something about them to admire, sincerely, and let them be who they are and acknowledge what you admire. If everyone would just do that once a day this world would be different. Meanwhile, be the kid you are, just a little while in the privacy of your own space and see how that feels.
LDSledge
May 20, 2006
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