Poetry International Poetry International
Poem

Philip Gross

The Boat Made of Poems

The Boat Made of Poems

The Boat Made of Poems

sings and hums and talks and whispers to itself.
              It never sleeps.
It groans, it shudders to the rhythm of the waves.
              Its timbers creak
in the language of every port it has put into –
              the backchat, the patois,
the babble, the Babel, the smuggled rich lingo
              of each dockside bar.
But hush: don’t tell the captain or the bosun
              or the loosely rhyming crew:
                      there’s really nothing to it, poetry,
just air, hot air and paper, oh, and skill
              and love and hope, between them
                           and the deep dark silent sea. 
Close

The Boat Made of Poems

sings and hums and talks and whispers to itself.
              It never sleeps.
It groans, it shudders to the rhythm of the waves.
              Its timbers creak
in the language of every port it has put into –
              the backchat, the patois,
the babble, the Babel, the smuggled rich lingo
              of each dockside bar.
But hush: don’t tell the captain or the bosun
              or the loosely rhyming crew:
                      there’s really nothing to it, poetry,
just air, hot air and paper, oh, and skill
              and love and hope, between them
                           and the deep dark silent sea. 

The Boat Made of Poems

Sponsors
Gemeente Rotterdam
Nederlands Letterenfonds
Stichting Van Beuningen Peterich-fonds
Prins Bernhard cultuurfonds
Lira fonds
Versopolis
J.E. Jurriaanse
Gefinancierd door de Europese Unie
Elise Mathilde Fonds
Stichting Verzameling van Wijngaarden-Boot
Veerhuis
VDM
Partners
LantarenVenster – Verhalenhuis Belvédère