When I was girl, aye, many a moon ago,
a landlubber me, me mateys too
sailed the ocean in books from the bilge,
the library basement racks, and ventured far,
anchored only by words like hook of the captain
luring us in like Moby, wee urchins to the salty seas,
uprising smartly when it was time to go.
But we’d come another day for a skull’s whistle.
“For a tale awaits on the shores of shelves,”
the spectacle’d lass in pumps and plum lips said.
“Pirate the world in an open palm, my beauties,
Steal the wind with a spell set on shivering leaves.”
Ahoy and avast! And we did, alit below the stars
of blackened ceilings open endlessly beyond
and long before days peering into Davey’s Locker..
In the gaze of the other 