In the Port of Schiper,

Across the bay of blue,

Where the bell-tower strikes like a melodious piper,

Amid the dense fog and the rain dew.

Over by the abandoned wharf,

Along the crooked, decrepit pier,

Lies a myth that time helped morph.

A manifest lost to the turbulent sea, where danger falls near,

And the fog cloaks Death,

Where the rocks are jagged.

Here is where they drew their last breath,

And the ship became razed and ragged.

So the story goes,

The last survivor a ghost on the pier,

A fisherman and his mortal throes,

Standing along the broken jetty with swirling fear.

Tourists come and go,

Asking about the dock in disrepair.

The residents shake their heads ‘no,’

It’s a ghost story, of course, three streets from the Port’s main square,

How would anyone believe such a tale?

But through the late-night gloom,

The Port of Schiper sees a silhouette out on the wharf, in the moonlight veil,

They tell the children the ghost story, taking the truth to their tomb.

Photo by Tom Podmore on Unsplash