This Island Marks Us, Tho
This island marks us, tho,
with a melancholy sting
Some stood face-first to the spray,
leaned over the rail of a ferry
crossing from Borden to Cape Tormentine, spirits
lightening as the water and growing distance
washed a layer of melancholia away
Others, bound to this island, rusted / like so many back-field
car husks. / Or darkened, disappearing into their own anorexic
shadows
Some reddened, pores bleeding sweat, exasperation, damnation
into money-hungry soil that bloomed bankruptcies
This island marks us,
Apprentices all. Masters, none
