Past Patagonia Poem by Percy Dovetonsils

Call me Fishmeal.
I'm about to set off
for big watery trouble
in the South Pacific,
but first
a night
at the Spouter Inn
with my harpooneer pard
Quequeg.

In the morning
we sign on
with the Pequod.
Quequeg signs with a whale,
which tells me
he didn't graduate
from Harvard or Yale.

This Ahab
has a fixed look
in his mad eye
hinting
he's not in search of whales
so much as
THE whale.

And now I think of it
the man's taken
a terrible beating
- - scarred split face, missing leg- -
and his whole being
cries out
for vengeance.

Maybe this isn't
the best voyage
to be on
but it's too late now.

We've cast anchor
and set sail,
bound for hell.

We're rounding Cape Horn,
and any whales
we take
and flens
on our way
across the Pacific

Won't slake
Ahab's thirst.

Any sensible sailor
would jump ship,
but where?
We're past Patagonia
and the sea
is infinitely empty
and wide.
Nary an island,
not even Easter,
or Christmas,
in sight.

Before I know it
I and my shipmates
are on a Nantucket Sleigh,
or slay, ride,
tugged here and there
by the angry, mighty,
parmacetti,
who head butts
the Pequod
to splintereens

and takes Ahab
below Ladies' Lingerie
and Children's Toys
to the Bottom.

Quequeg
saw this coming
in the bones he tossed
and built himself
a fine wooden coffin

which doesn't save him,
but becomes
the lifeboat
which saves me
and takes me
to the dry place
where I have the time
and space
to write
this.