The Buoy

The cold wind blows,
And nobody knows
Whence she came
Across the main,
She blew so hard
That shards of ice
Encrusted masts
And decks alike.
And still she sailed
Through leaden seas
A ghost of white
With frozen beams,
And on the deck the buoy
Glowed, the buoy glowed,
A beacon that Hell bestowed.
On that doomed ship.
April, 1881.

Like a dream, memories of the past, my academic life, my home and wife, ambition, all that had been so dear to me, seeped away like sand through an hour glass. Thus emptied of all that I had been, I became conscious of another self, a different level self, far more subtle than the somewhat crude, and arrogant Gary Patterson. It was as if some invisible force had deposited my human ego with its limited perspective upon a shelf, while my higher self wandered formless through a world far more expansive ever imagined by the scientific world of which I had been a part. I sensed the sea, vast, capricious, ever changing in form and mood, yet the mother of sentient life, and her errant human children. Above all I detected something special in this vessel, these heaving beams upon the sea propelled by wind against the sails, of heavy spars, and masts and salt encrusted rigging. Alas, much too soon I became conscious of my own sad plight, captive of the buoy's invisible occupant, deposited there by that mysterious serpent who had engulfed the buoy and I, and then departed.

"Look alive, men," came that voice again. "Let's get those fish cleaned and stowed below."

I searched him out, the owner of that voice, at once austere, business like. I discovered that he was the captain. I found him standing astern by the helm, pipe in hand, black booted, yellow slicker encasing a tall angular body, face draped with a beard as white as frost with hairy icicles drooping from the chin - nose like a hook, eyes that were as black as they were demanding of obedience, and above, hiding hair as white as his beard, a large sou'wester hat.

"Do you have a count yet, Mr. Baker?"

"Not yet Captain," came the reply. "But it's mainly herring, some cod, even some ling."

"Thank ye, Mr. Baker," the captain nodded, and began to fill his pipe.

"Do ye think we have time to lay the nets down again?" Baker asked. A man some twenty years younger than the captain, first mate aboard the vessel called the Marybelle out of Boston, Lincolnshire, he was shorter than the captain, wearing the same kind of foul weather gear, his feet sloshing around in fish entrails that littered the deck.

I noticed a change in the captain's face, a sudden blankness that took place. He seemed ready to say yes, then suddenly changed his mind. The captain looked at the sky, filled with clamoring gulls, and noted the position of the sun now dropping toward a bank of clouds in the otherwise clear heavens.

"No more today, Mate," he replied tersely. "Get the decks cleared as quickly as you can, lad. Looks like a bit of a blow coming in from the sou'west. We'll head north past Enfield Bank."

Then I heard it, a different kind of voice filtering through my consciousness. I realized that it was the captain, but he wasn't speaking. He was thinking.

"Shame to leave here. But, something tells me that we must move on. Perhaps up north we'll fill our holds, and then go home," he mused silently. "Home and Sarah. The Skirbeck Road with its view of the Hussey Tower. Walking through market square on a Saturday afternoon. The grandchildren gathered round the hearth. Soup boiling in the kettle over the fire."

Then a cry rang over the Marybelle. "Fish all stowed, Captain."

The captain broke his reverie, looked about. Men on the deck below the poop swabbing down the remnants of blood and entrails. Overhead the gulls still screamed and fought for scraps flung by sailors into the sea. Nets lay neatly stacked ready to be stowed.

He looked at the sky. Still clear it was. He glanced over the sea, catspaws fluttered across the calm surface, and the faint whisper of a breeze wafted against his cheeks, harbingers of that still distant storm. Perhaps they could outrun it. He looked at his watch, taking it out of his pocket and snapping open its gold cover. There, inside, was a tintype of Sarah with an oval face, brown hair with stripes of gray, a face, kind and gentle, eyes purposeful, shining with the clear light of honesty and simple piety. Eight o'clock. Three hours before dark. A hard day's work now ended. Time for Supper.

"Regular watches, Send a crew aloft, to set full canvass, Mr. Baker. If the good Lord is with us, we'll skirt the edge of yonder blow, and scuttle quickly up the coast toward the Shetlands."

"Aye, aye, sir."

Baker shouted orders and crewmen scrambled up the rigging to comply, first the topsails unfurled with a snap, and the Marybelle began to move ahead. Other sailors lashed the dories to stanchions on the deck and secured the nets atop the hatch covers to cleats affixed to the mainmast.

"Set the jib and the foresail," cried the mate. There was a flutter of canvas, and quickly the Marybelle began to pick up speed. Then Baker gave the order to set the main and mizzen. Crewmen hastened to the halyards to heave in unison and send the huge white sails rising up from their booms. The wind off the port quarter caused the Marybelle to heel as sailors trimmed her for a beam reach.

"Good work, Mr. Baker," said the Captain with a smile as he looked over the Marybelle. "Send the off-watch crew below."

"All those not on watch go below and rest," the first mate bellowed across the hatches.