Old Jim

Old Jim

Last summer Old Jim stayed ashore
And pottered round the stage and store.
On sunny days perhaps he'd tend
The flakes awhile, or help them mend
The trap, and tell about the year
The big berg took his fishing gear.

He likes to overhaul the cable,
And fuss about the splitting table,
But when the fog comes in the Sound
He only wants to lie around,
And pile the billets in the grate,
To trim his pipe, to doze -- and wait.

That face of seventy and seven
Was dated by the winds of Heaven,
Through storm-torn dawns those hands, so thin,
Have brought the battered schooner in;
And, Lord, those eyes that saw an age
Would just as soon you'd close the page.

The first snow isn't far away,
And Jim has kept abed all day.
The nets are dried; the fish is sold;
The debts are paid -- and Jim is old
So, grant him seas where he may sail
Unmindful of the autumn gale.

Greg Power