Captain Holm

I see Captain Holm
in yellow slicker,
right hand behind him
on the stick of the tiller, 
feet in the well
of his orange Sailfish: 
like a butterfly's
 single wing, it slants 
upright over the bay. 
Captain Holm, our neighbor, 
eighty years old,
thin and sclerotic,
can still fold
legs into the hull, 
balance a bony buttock 
on the shelf of the stern.

With a tug at the mainstay
he makes his sail trim up, 
sniffs out whatever wind there is. 
This raw day,
Captain Holm's alone,
his scrap of color
the only one
on the wide bay,
Winter sunset transfuses
that frail wing.



 =Tansy Mattingly