The Death Of Cook Poem by Michael Galvin

In sleep's uneasy tide
the explorer slips on black stone
gathered in the sea's white lace.

And in the fitful prism
his wife's awakening alarm
is reported to disconsolate crew.

Spears and scalp-white shouts in the swell,
catch his blue coat.

A canoe seeps from the darkness,
appalling the collared ship with rag-bound
fragments of a meridian
beyond farewell's discovery.

The Navy shaking quills
murmurs compensations.