Old Poem: Drawing Lots in the Bottom of the Boat

This is a poem I still like a fair bit, though apparently few felt the same way.  I used it to close the first section of the chapbook.


Drawing Lots in the Bottom of the Boat

All are blank
the whiteness does not last
black lines drawn upon the surface
they blur
resolve themselves into letters
spell out the dead man’s name
a rattle in the background —
the lots clatter together as they fall to the sea bed
we are relieved that the decision was made so easily
the sun recedes toward the horizon
the wind carries foreign sounds
into the harbor
somewhere, someone throws fish to the birds 
we watch the buildings begin a slow tumble
knock the clouds away
the waves push us from the shore
we wait for a single word


It is more overtly symbolic than most of my early poems.  The poem alludes to the book of Jonah, where indeed the sailors cast lots to find whom to sacrifice to calm the waters.  The ending is supposed to be somewhat dreamlike and ambiguous whether skyscrapers are indeed falling (somewhat eerie shades of 9/11 written roughly a decade earlier) and indeed whether the real irony is that the "saved" sailors have no safe port to which they may return.  I might well have had Nevil Shute's On the Beach on my mind at the time.

The Limited Fix was by its very nature a limited edition, and I created a special version with an extra freehand illustration on the back (done by me).  I thought it came out well (the city (almost certainly Manhattan) looking even more island-like than usual), though it was not at all in keeping with the computer-based clip art throughout the rest of the book.  Maybe I would have been better off doing all the drawings myself (not that this would have boosted sales or anything).  In any case, the illustration went along with this poem, so as a bonus I am attaching it here.