Girl in a Boat

She didn’t see the world playing above her,
above the sand with its waves of tiny crystals,
with its ear-horn shells and moonstones; was
oblivious to the clouds hanging like chandeliers.

The doggies she’d longed for were lost to her,
for Daddy wouldn’t draw them. Tears slipped free,
dripped in bucketfuls as abundant as the sea.
She was so like the sea, its oceanic tantrums.

A paper boat sat upon her palmy horizon,
folded with precision, its pointed edges so crisp;
and when Daddy gouged out the wettened sand,
she poured into it her own little pot of sea;

set the boat upon it then worried the water
to watch it bob. Why wouldn’t Daddy draw them?
Before her was world in itself, the sandy banks
surrounding a restless estuary. She saw herself in it,

felt the creases of the paper beneath her feet,
could just see over its starboard edge - magnificent! -
swayed with the boat as it rocked like a cradle.
Just as she pronounced herself Captain, her brother

tumbled into it, the oaf; the family roared, roared.
Still, there’ll be bigger boats to come, on better days
when she makes waves once again, vaster scenes
than these diorama dreams. Yes, she could see it all.

Terry Phillips


If you have any thoughts about this poem, Terry Phillips  would like to hear them.