Taongi

I don't know how they call you And I won't live to learn You've given water to a stranger Who has nothing to return

But stay a while, if you can stay — I'll only ask you this: There's a story going out with me That no one else will miss

We carried something wicked In the belly of the ship I never tried to name it Like a line I let it slip

And it moved among the men like frost Till the warmest of them cooled And I knew not then the cost When the captain had us fooled

So write it how I tell it Write it plainer than I've been I kept the watch and kept my quiet And the quiet let it in

And if it ever finds her Then tell her this beside: He left with empty pockets And your name inside his hands

I answered to a name once That was never rightly mine The harbor wore the morning Like smoke upon the tide

And the water turned a color Somewhere west of where we'd been I never found the word for it I will not say it now I've seen

Father, I'm not asking pardon For the pardon's not the point I'm asking that it's carried Past the failing of my voice

And if you pray, then pray her window Keeps a light for what I owed — But write the story first, and truly It's the heaviest of loads

And when you cannot read your writing And the paper's worn to sand Say he left with empty pockets... And her name inside his hands

Well, good God — who the hell was I, a Jonah in the belly of a fish that wouldn't die, to think the deep would spit me in the shallows of your side? I did not turn back. I did not ask.

And now the lead-line's dropping and it's fathoms till it's through, and the needle's given up its north and swings, and swings, to you — I did not turn back. I did not ask. Now I sound. Now I die.