[Poetry] Two Poems by Aden Sabin-White

River Man

My brother loved the river,

He always watched the quick stream;

As if it were his life passing by.

Love is not a floating emotion,

But the very current of the tide.

He said that if he knew that now

He would have kept his sons in mind.

He would have never left for the woods

And crossed the mountains to the sea.

He would have stayed home with them

To the very shores of eternity.

He’s marooned upon them now,

And he’s got dues to pay—

A duty to do the right thing,

But just like how it is to be,

It’s all just nonsense indeed.

Submariner

I saw myself in that deep pool of wine,

A reflective pool, a pond ever so slightly rippled

By a cool breeze of an autumn afternoon.

In my reflection, Narcissus smiles at me

And I despise him;

He has not half my beauty

Nor a quarter of my humility.

Yet, in the well of my silent admiration,

Rolls in a good man, and a foggy day,

He may never break one drop

Of the water’s tide; he shakes in wonder;

He was looking, searching, and never finding.

Chuckling to himself, he said to me,

“Look into the lake.

I’ve retired long to this pond,

I pray before its shore,

And live down in its bed

Beside my old friend, the grandpa trout.

I never miss anything by looking in the depths,

At least nothing I would have missed

Had I stayed at the surface.”

Benignly, I sneered at the arid air

Of this gaffer’s dry joke.

But, to turn my head was to twist it off

And throw it below the shallows:

I saw through the mirror, down below,

Till my eyes drowned and cried,

Tears as deep as that sunrise;

A colorful blend, and a pastel end.

It was indeed a heavenly pen and brush

Which painted across the crying sky,

On the wings of a light wood thrush,

His masterwork breaking upon the horizon’s shore.

My eyes became so sharp, then did I see,

There, above the clouds’ milky white delights

An eagle, that roosts, it coos a great caw

It spoons its children straight from the maw.

Perhaps its next prey is a lizard like me,

Laying out in the sun,

Sunbathing to warm up its cold, icy blood.

The eagle does not give a care or worry

‘Bout the things down below;

Up above, it’s always sunny

And steady, steady the day goes.

Then, in the night, bitter black, warmth it lacks,

The bird turns its back and flies

To sunny, sunny skies,

Chasing the hues of a rainbow

Always, always ahead.

A sunset is just a beginning

To a brighter day ahead.

Thus, the sun rose, purple haze and red rushed

To which he said much but nothing more,

That stonewall jaw shut forevermore, besides:

“To waste a breath makes life a dull bore.”

Aden Sabin-White is a student poet out of Massachusetts who is currently studying psychology at Clark University. His work is experimental and has been or will be published in the Writer's Garret 2024 Contest, the MA Bards Anthology, the Stray Words Journal issue "Restless Mind", and Livina Press Issue 9. Coming from around the Cape, Aden's life has been greatly influenced by the beach and the coastal getaway that changes with each season.