ALLEGORY Poem: The Ship’s Log, by Cheri Abramson

Tossed upon an angry sea
Waves an avalanche
Neptune above hears no plea
For mercy or lenience

Turmoil and fear
Further darken the void of night
No rage like nature’s so severe
Or so justified

Huddled below, dread his lone companion
Despondency thick in the air
Fervent prayers not withstanding,
Teetering on the edge of despair

An indifferent ocean’s decimation
Belies singular resolve in the din
A ship hand’s furiously scribbled narration
Of the catastrophe herein

How this calamity has come to be
The sum of his life’s amount
A hurried witness to history
A single eyewitness account

As the lone forsaken beholder
Of this night’s dire tragedy
Testimony lies heavy on his shoulders
As he hastily records for posterity

Details unknowable to all except one
This now amounts to his purpose
For when his writing is done
At least his life will have purchase

The responsibility, the exigency
Of finding meaning in the madness
He will not die alone at sea
If he can find the exactness

To describe this chain of horrible events
The world will know his pain
He will survive through these contents
He will live a’gain

Closure will come with the written account
Of a ship wrecked at sea
So he writes and he recounts
So as not to be lost in history

His entire being condensed down
Into this singular goal
Of marking the details of this night
So he dies not in vain or alone

The bow creaks, a feared shift
As wood splinters like glass
Solid matter breaks apart
Weightlessness a moment before the crash

The finality sets in as hope flees like a dream
Life holds no greater meaning
Or hides some sweeping scheme
Of a benevolent God poised to intervene

These words will not survive
And none shall know the truth
The last moments of life deprived
Of a legacy left to soothe

All is overtaken
By the churning tumult
Water heavy as lead
Bears down without fault

Words so recently written
In haste and urgency
Now slowly and silently sink
Below the surface of the sea