My first nights out on the water

sleeping with the ocean
a mere foot from my head

the ship at port / anchored creaks, lines grinding / groaning
I hear the neighbors either side
Intimately

have you read
a common topic so uncommon
elsewhere

“I’m dying to be a better reader”

like digging a hole
I like going to bed
or lying on a beach

back below, in my berth
I hear steady breathing a few feet away
only a thin wall separating our heads

her boyfriend’s in crab school

yep, they giggle
unlike the couple with Southern accents
from Florida

the knitting picked up again

I’m going to sleep
[I’m falling asleep]
and so is most of the rest

finally

how many times will I be up
in the middle of the night
the head’s up on deck

I’m glad it’s not raining
or heavily foggy

though we’re sleeping at sea
it’s calmer than a water bed

creaking and thumps
more likely my neighbors
than the interplay of planks and sea

yes, somebody’s bones

now, for that damned mosquito
or some scratching overhead

who just dropped what
on the deck above me?

a shutting door
with a latch
and shuffling

who’s securing the gear
in the dusk?

what a still, calm spot she’s chosen
for the night

3:30 am, a nearly full moon
scattering sound of steady traffic
the other side of Isle au Haut
(the south)
may simply be the water motion

there’s definitely surf other side,
slight breeze, 1 mph?
to the west

can barely see Polaris
light cloud cover

only one plane overhead
on the European flight way

and the flash of a fishing boat
light array
in the gap of Deer Isle

what’s all the noise around me tonight
besides a stray cough
or zipper

are we really that restless

I have no idea what the Patriots
or Sox
did over the weekend
though they’ve been spiraling downward

light snoring in my ear last night

I had the most erotic dream
of someone who in reality was almost well

This could become obsessive.