Introduction - 0 View from above upon arrival - 1 First Akbar door - 2 Gear - 3 Meeting the Division - 4 First Communion at Akbar - 5 Shepherd - 6 Lights out - 7 Vultures - 8 Get h’on Parade! - 9 Bandy - 10 Wakey–wakey! - 11 Smartening rig - 12 Economy Star - 13 Poetry Club - 14 The Writer - 15 The Skipper - 16 Boating - 17 Seamanship - 18 The Skipper's Kippers - 19 Moot Court - 20 Dirty Mary - 21 Cross–country - 22 Sailorboy - 23 Church Parade - 24 Fellini fragment on Jildy - 25 Deckscrap - 26 Cinderella Days - 27 Long Tom for 'Dead Men' - 28 Waiting for Podmore - 29 Akbar - 30 The Path - 31 Dirty Mary Dirty Mary looms at ends of leafy lanes Stands silhouetted on the hill, the wind Moulding her clothing to her ample form. She beckons besotted boys into bushes Gazes at the columns marching by With bovine–lustful eyes. Among the lads her legends Grow like toadstools, embroidered Beyond belief. Every fantasy Is told and retold, verbal Khama Sutra Rippling through the ranks rampant With what happened to a friend of a friend At the hands of the Circe on the hill Whom nobody has actually ever met. Maybe she is just an Earth Mother Watching over her flock of randy lads.

© Bill Meilen & Ravensong International 2007.