I hate the sea
Not for its salt or violence
But for its quiet desperation
It's terrible monotony.
Dad took us out from the harbour years ago
Cadging for mackerel on nylon lines:
When almost by mistake we hauled one in
It just wouldn't die
Thrashing in the boughs
Like a slice of battered aluminium.
Dad just laughed the more I cried.
He said he'd felt exactly the same
When he was my age and that
One day I'd be telling my son
The same thing he was telling me,
As we lost sight of land
The mackerel thrashing in the boughs
Like a slice of battered aluminium.
And that's why I hate the sea
Not for its salt or violence
But for its quiet desperation
Its terrible monotony
Peter Jukes 1991
