The Life I Lived - Imagined?

[Kristine_ES]

The bride was young and without calloused, rope-burned hands, and her family had no expectation other than for her to be gone.

 

My groom, the Captain, did well enough, and I would not praise the blessings of a home on the New Jersey coast and all its fine things because the Lord God demands humility and sacrifice--but I wonder if He demanded the same of the whales?

 

I was young and he was old, but he let me climb the rigging and taught me how to shoot the sun and box the compass--mariner's taboos be damned. I loved that he let me learn, and I loved his gruffness and coldness because no matter what befell us, I was there and he was there and we needed nothing more.

 

He loved my tan, weathered skin and fair hair that came from the hours on the widow's walk, and my distant love, hard as stone and constant, had no comment for the pretties, pale and frightened by some black sky or a bird's cry.

 

Fearlessly I paced the widow's walk and feasted on salt, wind, and red wine for weeks at a time and he never failed to come home; still I walk, salt tears the only repast to honor a man that in 100 years will surely come home.

 

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inspired by Jamie Hogan http://sixsentences.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-life-i-imagine-i-lived 

[Kristine_ES]

thank you for reading... high praise from you gentlemen, and it means an awful lot : )

[Jamie Hogan]

Hey now! First, I'm honored. Second, this is better than mine. "...my distant love, hard as stone and constant," I said that out loud, no joke, about three times. You see words together that others don't see, Kristine.

[Bill Floyd]

Bit of the sea shanty, love story, and a hint of ghost-y legend at the end?  I'll drink this grog!