THE LEGEND OF THE SEVENTH WAVE

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The artwork displayed a magnificent sight,

The size of that great ocean wave,

It grew from a ripple one thousand miles far,

Now it threatened a watery grave.

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The horrified seamen whose jaws were ajar,

Loud were their wails of distress,

The image can’t tell of their cries and their oaths,

For their bones on the seabed would rest.

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The canvas of merit could never reveal,

The screams of that hurricane gale,

The sound and the fury of torn sheets and spar,

The wasp-bite of spume and the hail.

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The deafening din as the maelstrom swept in,

And the wave number seven would wreak,

A carnage and hell and they knew it right well,

This wave was a monster, a freak.

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So, the rigging was silent in homage it seemed,

For nothing was heard of the sound,

Of bedlam as waves struck hull and the decks,

Was the psalm of the sailors who drown.

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‘Breathe in salty brine, oh shipmate of mine,

Your requiem sounds at your grave,

May the howl of the gale be the last psalm you hear,

And your hearse be this great ocean wave.’

Michael Walsh Maritime Poetry

THE LEAVING OF LIVERPOOL: Ex-Liverpool seaman Michael Walsh, Bestseller of 2025: 70 stories and over 100 pictures. A first-hand account of the British ships, seafarers, adventures and misadventures (1955 – 1975). A tribute to the ships and seamen of the then-largest merchant marine in history. https://www.lulu.com/shop/michael-walsh-and-nadiya-burlikova/the-leaving-of-liverpool/paperback/product-v89mgrp.html?q=&page=1&pageSize=4