flashed across the sky.
Horrendous torrents and
wild wailing winds
lashed, bashed the craft,
ripped rigging,
smashed through wood.
Foamy fiends
Clawed, gored.
Crewmen, flung off course,
clung frantically
to the bucking bulwarks.
Mariners jut their jaws
against the storm,
wrestle down the demons
of the deep.
Stalwart hands seize ropes,
right masts,
repair rigging,
fix the compass.
Decks clang with tools
and hammers.
The furnace is re-stoked.
Feeble rays lace the clouds.
Shimmering sunbeams warm
shivering men.
Dolphins dance on the depths.
Bellies fill with aromatic fish,
rum flows freely.
Song resounds on the rolling sea.