MERCATOR PROJECTIONBrilliant as Betelgeuse, say the crewas I peer through the sextant's eye, triangulate an arc of Pacific water west of Dakar. To know where you are must have been Galileo's dream, one eye riveted on earth's shadow roundly pressed across the moon. Must have been Vespucci's quest, adrift in the ocean's maw, waiting for the smell of America. Wind punches the genoa, sets my craft on beam planing across the waves.
chart my burial as if the world
Copyright 2000, Arthur Ginsberg
Arthur Ginsberg is a Seattle neurologist and the author of a volume of poetry titled Walking the Panther (Northwood Press, 1984). His writing has been published in several journals, including Arnazella, Beacon Review, Spindrift, Embers, and Prickly Pear.
|