Sixty seven days until we reach Key West.
We pull the longboat ashore. Most of the crew be collecting provisions such as fruit and game. I take me leave, to refresh and clear me mind, I says, and alone wander the beaches searching for clues to the nature of the Ghostbook. Plenty of rope and rigging. Plenty of trickery and flash in the beach glass reflecting light and luminosity.
I have walked quite some ways and discovered nothing that gives me the answers I seek. What be this? I see a form in the distance and shade me eyes from the sun with me hand hoping to create a clearer view. As I come closer, I see it be just rock outcroppings. But it was so strange; I thought it be a woman's form...
I sort of laugh out loud at me mistaken apparition when she steps out from behind the largest boulder. I be transfixed and fall to me knees: Her gown be ethereal white to match her snowy white hair and diaphonous skin. A necklace of coral circled thrice her throat. Tucked into the folds of her skirts are limbs of starfish and wings of seagulls. I recognize her instantly from the song of the beautiful sea maiden in the Captain's journal. She be the Black Swan Mother. In death, it was said, she keeps vigil over her resurrected child, Morgan La Fey. Beyond the rocks lie her Lunar Boat, the Polaris.
"Captain, I come to ye on behalf of the Black Swan Family. We be counting on yer efforts. You will be washed away: let it rain. Your current task seems impossible and futile. A task much too difficult and much too hard and hopeless, with little fruit to bear for your troubles. Do not despair, for you will recieve great bounty. But there is a weight you must release. Let your anger sink down with the anchor. Do not ever give up hope for what has been bestowed upon ye by a power greater than ye can imagine. Your losses are with me now and I will love them deeply to free you from the heaviness of your suffering. What you cannot forget will prevent your progress and success. Let me take them by the hand, Captain, let them go, worry yourself no longer. You are free. Steady as she goes Captain. This will be your lifeboat," and she hands me a small package.
"He was her only child, her baby boy.
She was his second daughter, his pride and joy.
The women gather crying
tears that fill a million oceans.
It doesn't matter where you're living.
The women gather crying tears that fill a million oceans.
The women gather crying tears that fill a million oceans.
The women gather crying tears that fill a million oceans.
The women gather crying tears that fill a million oceans.
The women gather crying tears that fill a million oceans.
It doesn't matter
It doesn't matter
It doesn't matter where you're living..."
Your Servant, Captain Billy Jack
(the above words are loosely quoted from an unknown songstress from an unknown song. This post is created in honor of me mother, the late, great, and most dearly loved and deeply missed, Jane Ann Brandley, AKA Josephine Juana La Loca who still encourages me with her gentleness and belief in me art and words. And I pass on to her, on this day, me three greatest wounds that so impede pilgrim's progress, so that I may move forward in me pursuits and commit to me own destiny voyage! I encourage ye to do the same...)
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