Thru Maritime Miles 5-Aftermath Poem by Bryan Norton

In only a moment of maritime mirth
My ship's maiden voyage was missing at birth
The King's Royal Navy reduced me in rank
By flushing my ship in the place where it sank

I fell in the sea with no source of a boat
The swell I could see was no course I could float
The sharks were completely the first to arrive
I knew they would eat me or let me survive

We cried out for help in the dead of the night
With talk of surrender we gave up the fight
My crusty old sailors were not in the mood
To sink in the soup of a shark brand of food

That evil young lady who tried to be bad
Was never the person who died with her dad
She may have defeated a shark in a crunch
Or maybe the shark was completed at lunch

It seems that her filling was dealing in pleasure
By methods of killing and stealing my treasure
Her aim was the same as the sunder of duty
To blame me and shame me and plunder my booty

My brave band of pirates were shaken and hobbled
I'm glad they were taken before they were gobbled
By someone who served them with honey and tea
And warm bunny blankets on beds made for three

When they were well-rested and ready for home
I sent them to places where old pirates roam
To seaports and pubs and the docks where they came
For bottles of rum and for seafaring game

But many are mateys who serve in good matches
With young pirate ladies in curves and eye patches
Where children are raised to be seen and not talking
Like peg-legged babies who lean before walking

Whose fathers are baddies in true pirate fashion
Who fetch them like daddies of new pirate passion
For prancing with rhinos that race in arenas
With dancing albinos who chase ballerinas

But all these excursions are merely diversions
For hook-fisted pirates who plan to be surgeons
The call of the sea and the promise of booty
Is why they come back for the new round of duty

I pondered the reason I got for my living
If Lori my lady is not so forgiving
My trip is to blame in the force of her speeches
A shipwreck of shame in the course that she teaches

My schemes have all perished like fish that are battered
In dreams that I cherished but now hardly mattered
My fortune is gone and my future is missing
And so is my bond with the one I was kissing.