About Me

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Sacramento, California, United States
so salty pieces of coral from surfing Hawaii in the 60's and 70's getting reef pounded living in my body fall through my skin from time to time!

sailing to Oahu

Jimi Hendrix was playing on Oahu. I had never sailed. Surfed Mexico, California, Hawaii! Aw, how hard could it be to sail 90-110 miles from Kauai to Oahu? Piece of cake, right? Remember it was the 60's! This is so bad. We thought we were looking at Kaiena Point,Ohau, knowing we weren't going to make the concert! But at least we were in site of Oahu-wrong! Coy, who had never sailed before, me,who had never sailed before, jeff and Abbott etc. We were looking at the sleeping giant on Kauai! We had done three-sixty's in the night! We sailed on the only tri-marran I've ever sailed on ( except later ) in my life, missed the concert! It was at the Waikiki Shell Ampitheater ( Moon eclipsed . We finally made Nawilwili Harbor! The Skipper tried to give us his boat saying, " It's trying to kill me"! We watched him go stark raving mad not even realising that had we got caught in the channel current we were on our way to Japan! Remember it was the 60's and we were going to see Hendrix. I left out some of the good stuff but I will make up for it later!

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

The Wreck Of The Hesperus

                                            

                             Henry Wadsworth Longfellow     ( 1807-1882 )



It was the schooner Hesperus,

That sailed the wintry sea;

And the skipper had taken his little daughtèr,

To bear him company.





Blue were her eyes as the fairy-flax,

Her cheeks like the dawn of day,

And her bosom white as the hawthorn buds,

That ope in the month of May.





The skipper he stood beside the helm,

His pipe was in his mouth,

And he watched how the veering flaw did blow

The smoke now West, now South.





Then up and spake an old Sailòr,

Had sailed to the Spanish Main,

"I pray thee, put into yonder port,

For I fear a hurricane.





"Last night, the moon had a golden ring,

And to-night no moon we see!"

The skipper, he blew a whiff from his pipe,

And a scornful laugh laughed he.





Colder and louder blew the wind,

A gale from the Northeast,

The snow fell hissing in the brine,

And the billows frothed like yeast.





Down came the storm, and smote amain

The vessel in its strength;

She shuddered and paused, like a frighted steed,

Then leaped her cable's length.





"Come hither! come hither! my little daughtèr,

And do not tremble so;

For I can weather the roughest gale

That ever wind did blow."





33He wrapped her warm in his seaman's coat

34 Against the stinging blast;

35He cut a rope from a broken spar,

36 And bound her to the mast.





"O father! I hear the church-bells ring,

Oh say, what may it be?"

"'T is a fog-bell on a rock-bound coast!" --

And he steered for the open sea.





"O father! I hear the sound of guns,

Oh say, what may it be?"

"Some ship in distress, that cannot live

In such an angry sea!"





"O father! I see a gleaming light,

Oh say, what may it be?"

But the father answered never a word,

A frozen corpse was he.





Lashed to the helm, all stiff and stark,

With his face turned to the skies,

The lantern gleamed through the gleaming snow

On his fixed and glassy eyes.





53Then the maiden clasped her hands and prayed

54 That savèd she might be;

55And she thought of Christ, who stilled the wave

56 On the Lake of Galilee.





And fast through the midnight dark and drear,

Through the whistling sleet and snow,

Like a sheeted ghost, the vessel swept

Tow'rds the reef of Norman's Woe.





And ever the fitful gusts between

A sound came from the land;

It was the sound of the trampling surf

On the rocks and the hard sea-sand.





The breakers were right beneath her bows,

She drifted a dreary wreck,

And a whooping billow swept the crew

Like icicles from her deck.





She struck where the white and fleecy waves

Looked soft as carded wool,

But the cruel rocks, they gored her side

Like the horns of an angry bull.





Her rattling shrouds, all sheathed in ice,

With the masts went by the board;

Like a vessel of glass, she stove and sank,

Ho! ho! the breakers roared!





At daybreak, on the bleak sea-beach,

A fisherman stood aghast,

To see the form of a maiden fair,

Lashed close to a drifting mast.





The salt sea was frozen on her breast,

The salt tears in her eyes;

And he saw her hair, like the brown sea-weed,

On the billows fall and rise.





Such was the wreck of the Hesperus,

In the midnight and the snow!

Christ save us all from a death like this,

On the reef of Norman's Woe!

The Calm by John Donne ( 1512-1631)

Our storm is past. and that storms tyrannus rage.

A stupid calm, but nothing it, doth 'suage.

The fable is inverted, and far more

A block afflicts, now, than a stork before.

Storms chafe, and soon wear out themselves, or us;

In calms, Heaven laughs to see us languish thus.

As steady'as I can wish that my thoughts were,

Smooth as thy mistress' glass, or what shines there,

The sea is now; and, as the isles which we

Seek, when we can move, our ships rooted be.

As water did in storms, now pitch runs out;

As lead, when a fir'd church becomes one spout.

And all our beauty, and our trim, decays,

Like courts removing, or like ended plays.

The fighting-place now seamen's rags supply;

And all the tackling is a frippery.

No use of lanthorns; and in one place lay

Feathers and dust, to-day and yesterday.

Earth's hollownesses, which the world's lungs are,

Have no more wind than the upper vault of air.

We can nor lost friends nor sought foes recover,

But meteor-like, save that we move not, hover.

Only the calenture together draws

Dear friends, which meet dead in great fishes' jaws;

And on the hatches, as on altars, lies

Each one, his own priest, and own sacrifice.

Who live, that miracle do multiply,

Where walkers in hot ovens do not die.

If in despite of these we swim, that hath

No more refreshing than our brimstone bath;

But from the sea into the ship we turn,

Like parboil'd wretches, on the coals to burn.

Like Bajazet encag'd, the shepherds' scoff,

Or like slack-sinew'd Samson, his hair off,

Languish our ships. Now as a myriad

Of ants durst th' emperor's lov'd snake invade,

The crawling gallies, sea-gaols, finny chips,

Might brave our pinnaces, now bed-rid ships.

Whether a rotten state, and hope of gain,

Or to disuse me from the queasy pain

Of being belov'd and loving, or the thirst

Of honour, or fair death, out-push'd me first,

I lose my end; for here, as well as I,

A desperate may live, and a coward die.

Stag, dog, and all which from or towards flies,

 paid with life or prey, or doing dies.

Fate grudges us all, and doth subtly lay

A scourge, 'gainst which we all forget to pray.

He that at sea prays for more wind, as well

Under the poles may beg cold, heat in hell.

What are we then? How little more, alas,

 man now, than before he was? He was

Nothing; for us, we are for nothing fit;

Chance, or ourselves, still disproportion it.

We have no power, no will, no sense; I lie,

should not then thus feel this misery.

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