This is a poem that I recently wrote about what makes a good sailor – and it isn’t sailing through calm waters.  It is in the form of a ballad (245 words).

*

Through quiet pools and constant breeze

All travellers wish to ride;

Their ships upon such highways might

So calmly surf the tides.

From A to B they wish to have

A smooth and gentle glide.

*

Yet easy rides devoid of squall

Make not the sailor strong;

He must, I say, be worth his salt

When all the plans go wrong

And give survival quite the tale

Enough to sing a song.

*

Upon his weather-beaten cheeks

Are wrinkles scarred by sun;

His calloused hands deformed by rope

Prove battles lost and won

When ship and soul and cargo all

Were drowned alike as one.

*

Along the decks, amid the gales,

He’d drop his knees in prayer

As panic crashing down in waves

Becomes his only care,

When sturdy craft, dashed hard on rock,

Needs overnight repairs.

*

His brine-stained lips might crack a smile;

His voice would strain a sound

For that survivor had become

The sum of his surrounds

Who’d passed through fields awash with death

Past harbours, reefs, and sounds.

*

You’d sit and listen to his grunts

Of what he’d gained and lost

Against the tempests of the deep

Where strength was ground and tossed

For he had passed through hell itself

In heat and thirst and frost.

*

And at that time you’d see just that

You’d just the man to steer

You through the flummox and the flow

Of all your hidden fears,

That man who’d shed behind that face

So many lonely tears.

*

© All rights reserved.  Nahum H. Sennitt 2025.