These are poems written about the sea and my connection to the sea. They are a companion to my semi autobiographical novel Tales From The Sea. Many were composed during exercises in my creative writing class. Available from Amazon.
There are still dockers working at unloading and loading ships but they are becoming a dying breed in Europe as more cargo travels in containers. This is my salute to them.
The Docker
Boxes, bales, crates, and bags
All shapes, all sizes and all weights
Grab, lift, heave, pull and push
With murderous looking hooks
All shining steel and wooden handles
Used sometimes to settle scores
Behind the shed way out of sight.
Aching muscles, creaking joints
A docker’s bane, a risk to take.
The patch of sky above our heads
Shows clouds rushing on the wind
Or sun casting shadows on the deck
Hidden, darkened as the next lift comes
On noisy crane and whirring wires
Another load to push in place
Stowed to reach some distant port
Unbroken, undamaged and intact.
Ten o’clock, a mug of tea
Then back to push and pull
And stow some more.
Lunch box opened one o’clock
In the shelter by the shed.
Just a brief relaxing break
Before we descend once more
Into our small square world
Where we work
Home that night for dinner
After to the docker’s club
To talk of cargoes and of ships
Bound for those exotic ports
Singapore, Bangkok Hong Kong
Then back to bed to get some rest
Before another stint
Down in the hold.
Eddie Gubbins
