The night wind blows the mail boat ashore, spilling sacks of yesterdays. Pictures of babies, postcards of piers and donkeys, and all those things that no one sends anymore, now that connection’s just a click away. The boat itself is webbed with rigging and wreathed in an ecstasy of shredded sails, its deck awash with sailors’ tall tales that storms have clawed from the deep. The crew is old and tired, with starfish eyes and hands ripped raw by a lifetime of rope and waves, and hearts which are constant flames wrapped in rimed glass. The captain stands stiff at the wheel, shoulders strong against the descending sky. He knows he should go down with his ship, but it will take a million years for these rocks to swallow them. The wind’s awash with thanks and promises, contracts and congratulations, prognostications of imminent disaster, and rows of figures that will never add up.
.
Oz Hardwick
Picture Nick Victor
.