Poem by R.M. Dolin, May 5, 2025, Read Other Poems
At least for now,
my soul's a sailor,
a heart devoid of harbor
wandering whimsically on
the leeward side of solitude
with no one other me
to lace my mind with worry.
There's a suddenness in goodbye
making the next start over
a friendless foe to fate.
Something you refuse to understand
any more me saying,
I can't give what I haven't got.
You may not yet be gone
but were always moving on,
like reflections of stillness
or tidal waves in moonlight,
a fallow fantasy your heart
has always known,
is not a sacred harbor for your soul.
From the R.M. Dolin novel, “An Unstainable Life.” Issac struggles to make sense of Darwin’s journals on how to survive a self-sustaining life. Random poems and idioms offer insights to his uncle’s personal life. Darwin beings this poem as an adventuring master of destiny while admitting he has nothing to offer. In the last stanza, he reveals his insecurity.
Written after chatting with a retired Coast Guard sailor about the dichotomy between fate and destiny . . . one of the many benefits of being a bartender.
