Albatross Night
Often to pass the time on board before the first-born
will catch an albatross, his wings of flame
which chaperone a Calm Night, the everlasting and the same,
across the bitter brooding mother over chaos..
Tied to the deck, whirling suns shall blaze and then decay
their fiery courses and then claim, embarrassed by its clumsiness.
Let its great white wings of the darkness whence they came
at its sides like a pair of unshipped oars, Back to Nirvanic.
How weak and awkward, even comical, feeble sun of life burns
this traveller but lately so adroit - and sounded is the hour.
One deckhand sticks a pipestem in its beak for my long sleep
another mocks the cripple that once flew! I shall,
the Poet, like this monarch of the clouds, the feverish light
riding the storm above the marksman's range, welcome the darkness
exiled on the ground. Hooted and jeered, I shall softly creep
because of his great wings, Into the quiet bosom of the Night
-- Charles Baudelaire & James Weldon Johnson
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