Another round of The Guardian Photo Poems, week seven! This week’s highlights from last year’s photo inspired poems include the fantastic juxtaposition of towering steel wind turbine and an old ship in sails, fog over the Guangji Bridge in China, and a hot air balloon near the Pyramid of the Sun on the vernal equinox. The final poem takes up the pantoum form. Be sure to follow the link to learn more about it; there will be a quiz! (All poems by Vincent H. Anastasi)
Photograph: Owen Humphreys/PA
Give Me the Ship
Give me the ship from Blyth
that discovered Antarctica:
the 36m gaffed riffed ketch,
the pine decking and masts,
twin-skinned, oak-hard,
hungry to navigate icy waters,
harnessing the tension of wind in full sail
to map uncharted seas!
Not the towering steel turbine,
gyrating about the shallow water,
its long airfoil wings
shackled to the continental shelf,
slave to land and economics
corroding in the salty spray
that beckoned William Smith
from Seaton Sluice to history!
Photograph: Lin Wenqiang/VCG via Getty Images
Navigating Fog
We are not like ships
passing in the night,
rather fog-engulfed vessels
navigating this grey wilderness.
Unseen, we must lean
into the aural landscape,
sounding each other’s hearts,
slowing to a modest pace,
silencing engine drone
‘till ears adjust and hear
echoes of crashing surf,
sea birds or barking dogs
piercing the disconcerting haze.
Set sails upwind
and plot a course
to a quiet mile-wide estuary
where we may harbor
in the memory of a Maine coast summer
when we watched the fog roll in,
swallowed in the embrace of new love.
Photograph: Marco Ugarte/AP
Song of Ascension
All our hearts seek ascension
Ancient stairs of sacred stone
Mere intimations of frustration
We cannot reach the sun alone
Ancient stairs of sacred stone
Nylon envelopes that rise
We cannot reach the sun alone
Despite all our lofty tries
Nylon envelopes that rise
Bearing baskets beyond reach,
Despite all our lofty tries
Descend again back through the breach
Bearing baskets beyond reach
Our hearts alone weigh us down
Descend again back through the breach;
O, what can lift us heaven bound?
Our hearts alone weigh us down,
Sandbags more than sails sublime.
O, what can lift us heaven bound?
Bind your heart to Christ divine!
Sandbags more than sails sublime,
All our hearts seek ascension.
Bind your heart to Christ divine
Whose mediation thwarts frustration!
the deepening ground 
I fell in love with navigating fog even before I read the closing lines ♥️ How did I never hear this. This is one of the ones that is way more than a unique commentary on an interesting photo. This had depth beyond the two dimensional that I obviously related with!
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