Lover's Boat

As in a nest the rotted hull
of a boat marooned in snow
has whiled away winter after winter
till dreams lay flattened
like the long-dead leaves
cradled in its ribs

where lovers had lain adrift in sunlit ripples
or rode on moon paths that shone back
with tints of gold into the ink of night.
Memories now at rest in the weathered hull

are as silent as the stars of that night
when the boat fetched the breeze away from shore
and bore the castaways rocking and lapping
into the waves that love set loose.

Darts of light fleeted into darkness
and silhouettes into solitude.
Loves afloat in a constant ebb decayed

as now aground, the dew-soaked hull
fills again with snow.
Bedded in weeds over the glide of seasons
lichens take hold where hands
once held and caressed.

-- Paul August Jasmer
Nov. 15, 2006