His nails stuck deeply in the wreck,
the poet is recalling all his life:
a magnificent vessel, in the past days,
with the figurehead, at bow, smiling
forever to the waves, which played to water
its gorgeous breasts, her golden sight lost
so far away to hollow azure bowels,
and the Iris was sitting on the stern,
unseen by anybody, and with her feet
was playing to draw splashes from the wake.
poor ship, so overloaded with gold
to look like a brothel of old days,
white sails always pregnant by the wind
against a sky all black for coming storms,
may everyone forgive your being baroque:
and, even if of you are now remaining
no more than a few scattered floatsams,
two liquid dolphins, a wave of gold
and an iridescent one, are gently drawing
the poet, ahead to the shore.