What Caesar Learned at Sea

Celestial fury reddens the morning sky, rebukes arrogant sailors in blustery refrains punctuated by syncopated thunderclaps. Men are set adrift, lifted, flung about by a swell of consensus, a mob of seawater riled to sport. The sea is free; the sea is freedom. Alphabet is written in chalk, but azimuth is written in the sky tethered to earth’s gut giving each man his bearing equally. Life is simple: find where the sky meets the sea; above that line is heaven; all else is hell. Let the sea moisten your brow with salted kisses, rock you in her ebbs and flows, and swaddle you in velvet black; only then can a man dare dream. Dog watch is the last watch—early morning to daybreak; sleepy 
sailors have no strength to meddle in a slave’s quiet study of the stars. Follow the drinking gourd. God’s breath carries seabirds to their nesting. Sisyphus and I are old friends; pass him on the freedom way and again on the drag back. Life is sand spilled into the sea. To dream of freedom is arrogance. Waiting is work; waiting for God to trouble the water. Caesar will be free, in this life or the next. No man can own another man’s soul—body maybe, but a man’s soul on the zephyr is free. The sea is one long sigh.