Man was a mug, really,
to give them his right age:
I could have gone on
being the lighthouse keeper
for another ten years. Fishing,
lighting her, keeping her clean,
end-for-ending the tablecloth.
A small whale beached below
once. I cut it up for the dogs.
It was good out on the bo’sun’s
chair, slathering on paint
with my safety ladder going up,
thinking about cows, and seals,
sand dollars and my wives and stuff.
Queerest thing about the job,
the light that jabs away out
at night, and rides the horizons
comes out of just a bulb
inside this turntable rack
of like thick glass saucers.
When I’d switch her off
of a summer morning
and polish those ridgy lenses
I had to draw the curtains
round the windows facing inland
or else the sun could spike in
through them, the lenses, and make
rays, and set all the bush alight.