by Frederick Pollack.
Spent half the voyage throwing up.
May even have lost weight.
The face reluctantly seen
bending over the sink in my cabin had lost
all hue but that of rosacea.
However, by the time
we docked I had gotten my sea legs, and stood
on deck in sweaters and backpack with
the pride of an archetype: The Man from the Sea.
Cobblestones wound uphill
from the street along the docks.
The mist was perfect, hiding cars, half-
revealing people: women rinsing pavement
in front of shops, gangsters loitering.
The chalk on one signboard said,
It would help if you had the least
idea why you were here.
American Breakfast €12.
That’s true, I reflected over coffee,
gazing up at the ruined castle
on the heights, trying out the word “home,”
which didn’t work. Thinking
back to when time was binary, with sex
either happening or not;
now it’s so complex
it stalls sometimes. I paid and moved on. Possibly
this would have been good in the third person.