Prize-winning stories and poems – 3
Today’s poem, The Fisherman’s Tale, is inspired by Devon and the local fishermen who risk life and limb to bring food to the tables of the south-west community. It reminds us of the dangerous job they do, and how we should appreciate them because of it. For a full list of my poetry and fiction and the prizes, commendations etc. they’ve won, please visit www.bruceleonardharris.com.
The Fisherman’s Tale
‘Don’t take the boat out, Ned my love,
don’t go out to the sea today.
By the Devil below and the Lord above
look to the looming sky and stay’.
A solitary woman, alone on the shore,
hearing the whispering storm approaching
remembers her father’s words once more
as he gave her a careful weather coaching.
‘Shall I stop by the hearth, my precious Jane,
toasting my toes, in a doze and a glow,
and relax as my family starves in pain,
because my coward’s bones won’t go?’
‘Yes, Ned, our children must be bred and fed
to grow ever stronger on a bounty of sea
but that cannot happen when their father is dead
and they’re facing a future never to be’.
She hears the crew bellow, the door latch go,
and the stone crunching boots plodding away.
‘Father’s gone’; a child’s voice, soft and low;
in the yard, she tries to make herself pray.
‘The next wave will do for us, my precious one,
our broken bones are for Davy Jones’ sleep;
your husband was wrong, and now he is gone,
just another dark skeleton feeding the deep’.
By the wharf, she watches the bodies arrive
their scant nakedness tarpaulin-covered
and a five-strong forsaken family alive
that now must somehow still be mothered.
‘Don’t take the boat out, Ned, my love,
don’t risk your precious life today,
by the Devil below and the Lord above
look to the looming sky and stay’.