The Cloud
Posted: August 7th, 2017, 10:43 pm
A small ship, an old ship
Scarred relic of past wars
That young sailors never knew
That old sailors never forget,
She sails now with tattered dignity
From one sad port to another
Doing tasks her younger sisters,
Still flower-fresh in shipyard paint, disdain.
Even the waters she sails are ignored by others
Who seek shorter routes to more comfortable harbors.
And so she is alone
On an empty sea, beneath an empty sky,
Her lookouts scanning the empty horizon
With nothing to report, nothing to report, nothing to report.
Except the cloud.
Seas and clouds, close links
In the endless water-chain
That replenishes life.
A sailor lives as closely with one
As he does with the other, and,
save those that signal storms,
Clouds are unremarkable.
But this cloud should not be there at all,
Off the port bow and miles away
In a sky which has been devoid for days
Of even a whisper of clouds.
It is large, almost perfectly round,
Flat on top and bottom
And it is black, the deepest black-hole black,
Showing not even the faintest reflection of sunlight
Or the silver lining we all grew up believing
That every cloud owns.
As though this were something else, pretending to be a cloud.
And it is heading for the ship.
That is the feeling of this thing as it draws closer,
That its motion is deliberate, its intent malevolent.
Eyes turn to the Captain,
Half expecting him to order a course change to avoid,
Half fearing that he would and the cloud would follow.
But the Captain, nearing retirement,
Keeps his silence with a slight smile,
Seeking to add one more event
To the strange things he has seen
In a lifetime at sea.
The cloud nears,
Its dark shadow on the water smothers
The sun’s reflected fire.
Conversation on the bridge stops.
Cigarettes are extinguished
Coffee mugs are emptied and stored
As though the crew is preparing
To go to battle stations.
Then, it is overhead
Its shadow felt as much as seen.
Machinery and engine noise
Seem suddenly muffled
And the silence of the cloud
Oppressive and absolute,
Is now the silence of the ship.
No one moves
And the few who dare to breathe
Will swear the air smells strange.
No one speaks
But all eyes say the same thing:
Something...alien…is here.
In a millennium or two,
Life returns to the ship
And to those who serve her
As the cloud moves on.
No one looks after it
Or speaks of that dark moment.
Cigarettes are lit, coffee mugs refilled,
And the idle chatter of the bridge watch returns.
Sailors, by tradition, are superstitious
But at sea, superstition is best expressed
In supreme nonchalance.
By Captains more than others.
That is why they are Captains.
So the small ship, the old ship
Sails on to the next sad port,
And young sailors, old sailors alike
Will have this day in common to remember
But will not speak of it
Any more than the ship’s log
Which will bear the single entry for this watch:
“Steaming as before”.
Scarred relic of past wars
That young sailors never knew
That old sailors never forget,
She sails now with tattered dignity
From one sad port to another
Doing tasks her younger sisters,
Still flower-fresh in shipyard paint, disdain.
Even the waters she sails are ignored by others
Who seek shorter routes to more comfortable harbors.
And so she is alone
On an empty sea, beneath an empty sky,
Her lookouts scanning the empty horizon
With nothing to report, nothing to report, nothing to report.
Except the cloud.
Seas and clouds, close links
In the endless water-chain
That replenishes life.
A sailor lives as closely with one
As he does with the other, and,
save those that signal storms,
Clouds are unremarkable.
But this cloud should not be there at all,
Off the port bow and miles away
In a sky which has been devoid for days
Of even a whisper of clouds.
It is large, almost perfectly round,
Flat on top and bottom
And it is black, the deepest black-hole black,
Showing not even the faintest reflection of sunlight
Or the silver lining we all grew up believing
That every cloud owns.
As though this were something else, pretending to be a cloud.
And it is heading for the ship.
That is the feeling of this thing as it draws closer,
That its motion is deliberate, its intent malevolent.
Eyes turn to the Captain,
Half expecting him to order a course change to avoid,
Half fearing that he would and the cloud would follow.
But the Captain, nearing retirement,
Keeps his silence with a slight smile,
Seeking to add one more event
To the strange things he has seen
In a lifetime at sea.
The cloud nears,
Its dark shadow on the water smothers
The sun’s reflected fire.
Conversation on the bridge stops.
Cigarettes are extinguished
Coffee mugs are emptied and stored
As though the crew is preparing
To go to battle stations.
Then, it is overhead
Its shadow felt as much as seen.
Machinery and engine noise
Seem suddenly muffled
And the silence of the cloud
Oppressive and absolute,
Is now the silence of the ship.
No one moves
And the few who dare to breathe
Will swear the air smells strange.
No one speaks
But all eyes say the same thing:
Something...alien…is here.
In a millennium or two,
Life returns to the ship
And to those who serve her
As the cloud moves on.
No one looks after it
Or speaks of that dark moment.
Cigarettes are lit, coffee mugs refilled,
And the idle chatter of the bridge watch returns.
Sailors, by tradition, are superstitious
But at sea, superstition is best expressed
In supreme nonchalance.
By Captains more than others.
That is why they are Captains.
So the small ship, the old ship
Sails on to the next sad port,
And young sailors, old sailors alike
Will have this day in common to remember
But will not speak of it
Any more than the ship’s log
Which will bear the single entry for this watch:
“Steaming as before”.
