Afternoon Sail

   As we shoot across

The glimmering plain

With jib taut as steel

And hauled-in main,

I watch the horizon wobble,

Shaken by swells of pure

Cobalt, littered with stars

That swim in pools of azure.

And then, in a cloudburst of spume,

We tack into a quilt of sapphires,

And the setting sun throws

Streaks of flaring wildfire

Across our course.

The sky turns deep blue, cold,

And the moon graphs our course ,

As it did the mariners' of old.