Sorry, a bit more Shakespeare allusion. I've also used a lot of technical
terms which I find has its own poetry. See what you think.

BOAT BUILDING - A WINTERS TALE

Worst of many sounds amongst the voices,
of tapping, grinding and sawing - a plank
begins to split, prelude to starting a line
of fresh timber, its own cadenza in a concerto,
the notes found in thicknessing, planing and cutting
fore and aft, a bevel along the full length
to fit complex joints and rivet all over again.

Time is costed in days throughout winter,
includes the pauses for coffee huddles round
a wood burning stove that eats off-cuts continuously,
while we watch her lines form into gracefulness
some weeks after the crucial laying of the keel
in our season of private boat building alchemy.
Only true love could make us carry on.

One minute her wood is all sweetness
where shavings slide off like slivers of cheese -
next knotty, awkward, makes the plane blade
slip, judder. All this to see her come to life;
we are a collective Leontes and she, always she,
our Hermione, close to a first kiss of paint.


bw
James


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