Columbus's First Voyage

The Captain says, “We’re fine. We’re sailing right on time!”
But to us, the Earth is flat and we are sailing off the end.
There are mythical water-demons constantly haunting the depths around our boat.
And I just saw a whirlpool take shape a knot or so back there.

“We’ll reach the New World, yet.”
But his assurances don’t replace our lost pounds with bread, don’t dull our boredom.
They don’t change the fact that we are tired and scared;
That we have lost our perspective.

We are two months out of Spain; no one has ever come this far.
It is early October, last I heard; no one has ever known the storms that we fear.
We grow closer and closer to the water’s edge; no one has ever been guided by these stars.
No birds, no dolphins, no driftwood is near; no has ever come back from here.

He cannot make us without fear.
His words are increasingly meaningless.
If we don’t see a bird or stick or sign of land soon, there’ll be hell to pay.
We won’t die at sea, won't allow our bodies to be given up at the end of times.

If the sea is just a building lesson in fear and deprivation, than we want no part of it.
If there is no happiness, and only miserable lessons at sea, than we want no part of it.
If there is nothing here but miles and miles of empty water, than we want no part of it.
We have lost our perspective; we do not remember the feel of dirt.
If this is the sea, than we want no part of it.

You give me miles and miles of mountains, I asked for the sea.

The Lecturer

I see into their eyes.
A roomful of pairs, pointed my direction.
The audience sits across a multi-tiered auditorium, and every face is turned toward their academic father.
I am addressing them, and they all know “me”.
But I am afraid that they know more.
That they see past the pair of brown lies that pass for my eyes.
I am afraid that they can see plainly what I have seen plainly.
To my mind they are judges, and like God they sit on their thrones and question me.
Only God has forgiven me, and these watchers cannot.
“Liar! Adulterer! Murderer of Christ!” their eyes say again, again.
“We have seen what you have witnessed in the shadowy corners of the ghetto.”
“You are unworthy of love,” they tell me, as if my memories were branded upon my skin like red scarlet letters.
This is my fear come true.
Needless to say, I cannot make eye contact.
I cannot come clean or make myself known.

So I remain a distant lecturer.
I speak at them, and not to them.
I teach them knowledge, but not wisdom or hard won realizations.
I do not impart my devil’s visions to the classroom.
I remain a distant lecturer, and this forever I will be.