There is a song for the dead
and the drowned
the tune of which I can’t remember,
so many seasons from the sea.
Though there was a time
I understood
as my twisted ankle
understands the rain.
After three summers on the Rock,
it came to me
from the breaking thunder
of the surf beyond the cove.
The night before, two fishermen
juiced up on screech
played chicken in the harbour.
Neither man gave in.
They too must have understood
the silent song
as their rubbers sucked up
the inky liquid
like a drunkard’s throat
and pulled them like a sinker
past the schools of startled fish.
It might have lulled them
like the rocking
of their father’s boats
before the sound
of their screaming
lungs opened a hole in the middle
of their faces—a gate of teeth
to sluice the briny drink
and kill the pain.
That same night
after the divers from the RCMP
had dredged the bloated bodies
from their temporary graves
I heard the siren call
to me again—
across the Hellespont of sleep.
I felt her humming softly
in the marrow of my growing bones.
In the bed beside my own
my brother slept as soundly
as the swimmers.
His tiny chest rose and fell
lost to the voice
that pulled me
out the front door
and across the gravel drive
that ended at the fishery,
to the tilted merry-go-round
at the threshold of the sea.
Perhaps it was the light
of the moon, or the cool grass
dew-damp against my toes
that woke me
by the water’s crafty edge.
Perhaps the siren
was sated with her catch
the night before
and offered my mother
a casual reprieve.
In any case,
there is a song
the dead can sing you.
There is a song; there is a song.
