Island Solo (Outward Bound, Penobscot Bay)

A sturdy craft comes alive under the boards,
As if in recognition of familiar waters.
The night's dark splash is ignited with phosphorescence
And trails away, bubbling in distinctive chords.

The stern red beam of a lighthouse
Asserts an invisible shoreline,
And warns of an imminent landfall
Through ledges, 'bricks' and 'No Man's Land',
Towards ill-defined sentinels of birch and pine.

A granite island looms behind darkness' deceptive vision,
But safe haven promises a gentler welcoming.
Empty moorings and trim wooden shacks
Legitimize at once the navigational decision.

The unwieldy blocks and obelisks are as marvelous as those
At Stonehenge and Easter Island,
For they hold in their gargantuan impassivity a story
And a mystery, perhaps,
Of a time when human spirit and endeavor arose.

But in daylight, the ruins beg a question or two.
Jumbled heaps of stone are scattered about;
Here and there stand unfamiliar sculptings and carvings,
And the ghost of a quarry where industry grew.

Will a future civilization look at these ruins and wonder
At such a chaos of pioneering landscape architecture?
(Or ask why foundations are now choked with wildflower,
Or for what purpose an island's marrow was torn asunder?)

It seems we hack and hew at nature, as at each other,
Not envisioning the questions that may be asked later.
Meaningless blocks, we strew haphazardly on our paths
For others to interpret, if they bother.

Leaving the island before sunrise, the red light is dim,
The phosphorescence gone.
But my understanding has been enlightened
By the granite, and by other builders
Who serve, strive and never yield
In their quest for a reconstructed dawn.