Martin Robertson

Now and Then

Shipwreck

The waves move on uncharted courses

to lose themselves, or break on sand,

rock, shingle—continent or island,

coasts lost down bare horizons.

In widening intervals the wind

drowns scattered voices.

By star and compass these as one

kept their fixed course—where does not matter

now, nor under cloud or clear stars

what wind casts on what shore

these baulks to which they cling, this water

in which they drown.