I wrote this sometime between 2002 and 2007. It’s part of the Orien Cycle, a collection of epic and lyric poems from the world that I was writing in at the time.

Today I release this poem for the health and safety of the migrants from the ship that sank in the Mediterranean.

The ocean is both ally and foe,
Ever dark and dangerous and deep:
Men go out — and some never return.
The tides will rise and fall in their flow.
The storms will come and women will weep
The ocean is both ally and foe.
The whales will depart and then return
The kraken may wake from his long sleep.
Men go out — and some never return.
The lanterns on the fishing boats glow
While men their watery harvest reap:
The ocean is both ally and foe.
The young brides fear but the old crones know
the terrors Mother Ocean can keep:
Men go out — and some never return.
The quake shakes earth, and the sea will churn;
The coastlines vanish, the breakers leap.
The ocean is both ally and foe:
Men go out — and some never return.

May more of them come safe to shore and be fed, housed, and comforted in their new land.

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