Signs of Land

We see a golden line
Around a smaller cloud
And there's our sign of land

The Captain won't come out of his cabin
And there's been talk of mutiny
But what's the point
When it's the Captain suggesting it

We play stones on deck
And wager stones as money

Stones go in the water
And stones come out

And if the stones are blue
That means two more days
Drifting on a solid liquid floor

And if the stones are black
That means we'll be safe soon

That's a sign of land

The seagulls fly lower everyday

The cook says he wishes they would fly even lower
So we could throw stones at them
Bring them down to the deck
And have a little meat for a change
Instead of cooked seaweed

But when the seagulls start to swoop
We don't think about taking them down
We only think about getting out of their way

The first mate laughs at us
Tells us seagulls aren't hawks
They're not looking to peck our eyes out
And why don't we act like men for a change

But he stops laughing
When we find the lookout
In the crow's nest one morning
With half his body gone

Pecked away

They must have come for him during the night

The first mate says seagulls don't fly at night

'You never see a seagull at night,' he says

But we notice he doesn't laugh
Like he used to
When the seagulls swoop down

He gets down below deck
Just like the rest of us

Meanwhile, we wait for signs of land

. . . . .

The heat overtakes us during the day
And at night it gets so cold
We break down our pride
And huddle together underneath
Pieces of the sails
We ripped off
So that we wouldn't freeze to death

The first mate yelled at us
As we were doing it
But when he tries reporting us
To the Captain
He finds him with his wrists
Nailed through
To his desk

And his log has the same thing written on it
Over and over again--

'NoSiGnSoFlAnDnOsIgNsOfLaNdNoSiGnSoFlAnDnOsIgNsOfLaNdNoSiGnSoFlAnDnOsIgNsOfLaNd'

The first mate tells us
That he's captain now
But we shove him ondeck
As soon as we see the moon
And tell him that a real captain
Should be able to make it until morning

While we're below deck
Wrapped up in the sails that smell like salt
And each other smelling like dead bodies
We hear him banging on the door
Whimpering like a little girl
Saying he sees them

He sees them blocking the moon

Then we hear wings flapping
And a body hitting the wood
On the deck
And then there's quiet
Just quiet

In the morning we find ten fingernails
And a patch of red
In front of the door

We don't know if what we see
Has to do with the seagulls
Or something else

But now we stay below deck
At night
And away from the door altogether

. . . . .

We see the grey seaweed and celebrate
Because grey seaweed is a sign of land
But the cook says we can't eat the grey seaweed
And that means land better appear soon

The cook asks for an assistant
To help him in the kitchen

He's never needed one before
But it's getting so hot
He says he can't stay in there all day
Without passing out
And he needs someone to take turns with

The boy we picked up
Right before we left the islands
Raises his hand

He's tiny now, skin and bones
Because the men don't let him eat
Until they've all had their share

He must think that once he's in the kitchen
He can steal some food away from himself
Even though cook has a sharp eye
And sharp knives
For anybody with a wandering palm

It's a day with no food
Before we think to send anybody down into the kitchen
To see what's going on

The man we send comes running back
Saying we better hurry

The kitchen is clean
Cleaner than anyone's ever seen it

And the boy is sitting at the table
Cleaning one of the knives

When we ask him where the cook is
He tells us 'cook jump ship'

Just like that
In his island accent

'Cook jump ship.  Dinner soon.'

We see the bowl of grey seaweed
Steaming, already turning brown

And we say that cook says
We can't eat grey seaweed
Or we'll get sick

The island boy laughs at us
Then points the knife
Right at our hearts
And says--

'You'll eat what I make or you'll starve'

And he slams the knife
Down into his hand

We fall back
But when he lifts it
There's no blood

'A trick,' he says, 'Just a trick'

Then we all go back on deck
And get ready for dinner

But one of the men says
And he swears it's true

That the island boy
Looks fatter

. . . . .

The water turns red
And the men say
It's a sign of land

One of them
Jumps out of the boat
And lands on his feet

'Come on!' he says, 'It's land'

But it still moves like water
And shifts like water
And rolls along
Like the water does

The man laughs and splashes
But stays on the surface
Not even getting
So much as a toe wet

We all think we're seeing an oasis
But then another man jumps down
And lands on the red
And he manages to stay dry as well

The men run around
Making fun of us still on the boat

But we still can't help but think
It's not land

It's not really land

Then one of the men puts his foot down
And it goes under the red
Up to the ankle

And when he goes to pull it out
It won't come up

The other man tries to help him
But then his foot goes under
Up to the knee

Soon both are going down
Inch by inch

Screaming at us onboard
To throw them a rope
So they can pull themselves out

But when we do
They pull the rope
And the ship moves
We can feel it
It starts to go down into the red with them
So we...

We cut the rope

With their last breaths they curse us
But as soon as the red fills their mouths
And the tops of their heads goes under
The water goes back to blue again
And we feel safe

Until we hear the seagulls flying
Over our heads

. . . . .

When we wake up
We're lying on sand
And the ship is gone

Just gone

A few men are gone with it
But most of us are here

The island boy's knife
Washes up
Along with some pots and pans
And that's all we see of him

We walk for a ways
And come upon a village
Where they take us in
And feed us

We tell them our ship got caught in a storm
And in many ways we feel we're telling the truth

We become men of the village

Shop owners and farmers
Husbands and fathers

We grow old
We laugh, but not often

There's still something separate about us
About who we are

And sometimes at night
We wake up
Next to our wives
Or alone in our beds

And we're sweating sea water
Convinced that these past years
Have been another illusion
Another paradise that wasn't there

And that we're still on the ship
Looking for signs of land

Then we wipe the salt off our skins
And lay our heads back down on our soft pillows
And tell ourselves
The nightmare's over

It's over

And just then
While we're turned away
From the moonlight
Coming through the window

We hear the tapping
On the glass

And the sound
Of wings