The oars fell from our hands. We climbed the dark
Slopes of kelp to the stairway up the rock.
Scott went first, grasping the fraying rope.
The rest of us followed, dragging the iron rack.
The crest was bare, but after scanty search
In a bird’s burrow we found the hunted man.
His flesh was naked and hard as barren earth,
His arms like scythes. His eyes spoke like a gun.
Before him we retired, unmanned by fear.
Unarmed, he seemed to move with harmful light.
Scott only stood, shaming us in the end.
The fugitive surrendered without fight.
We laid him on the painful rack, stretched tight
His limbs and bound his feet and wrists with wire,
Set leaden weights upon his sunken chest
And tied his head down by the matted hair.
We turned the cranks and wrenched him hour by hour.
In silence he endured. He would not speak
Of the hidden ore. At last his joints burst out
And jetting from the ruptures fire broke.
Then lay before us on the rigid rack
Straw limbs and a horse’s polished skull.
Gulls mocked as walked away across the sea
The man we hunted but could not keep or kill.
We threw the rack into the hungry surf
And hacked the turf in anger with our swords.
Then, re-embarking on our fruitless voyage,
We left the island to the mice and birds.
(George Woodcock)
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Based on Topics: Man Poems, Light Poems, Fear Poems, Birds Poems, Hair Poems, Anger Poems, Silence Poems, Horse PoemsBased on Keywords: unmanned, cranks, shaming, kelp, harmful, jetting, fraying, ruptures