You painted galleons, full-bellied clipper ships, pretty little sloops and cutters. I hoisted signals, sent up flares, imagined you would cast me a line. Some rare days you did but you always cast short, or your hawsers slipped like eels through my fingers. If love was the ocean you sailed in your heart, you must have lacked a sextant, charts. Where the night sky winked or sea-birds flew, there you set your course and steered gladly. Many rose-tinted dawns I floundered awake, salt-sick and searching for your sail. That last watch, though, we were scudding along, counting bells at the bowsprit till morning. Saw the sun spread her legs and the sea break red. A kittiwake dove into the fire.