Sunbird position 32:13.5N 54:32.1W
Local Noon on 2^nd June

The Magnificent Seven

7 days at sea

Averaging 7 knots a hour

Maybe more

With Only 7 hours of motor-sailing

We are 700 plus 300 nautical miles

To the good

7 players

6 people one bird

A 70ft minus 10ft Sunbird

Who has spread her wings

Via stay sail and spinnaker

To sail the 7 seas

24/7 she glides

Over 7 shades of blue

Under 7 by 7 billion stars

Which we counted

7 is septet

Not sextant

But it is the latter

That has caused Medi to break 7 pencils.

With 7 creases on a knitted brow

She thumbs through 7 pages

On a salt licked almanac

Or consults Steve

Who last did the celestial maths

Some 7 years ago

And draws 7 diagrams

The masters of which

Are dusted down

From a school book

Buried in the bilges of the boat.

Medi returns to her cabin

And soothes an aching brain

With chocolate bar number 7

From a 70 strong cache

7 times a day

Ben goes to bed

Or panics for 7 seconds

Whilst shouting

FISH, I don’t know what to do!

As an aquatic foe

Pulls the nylon tow  

For the 17^th time

7 luckless lures

Lost to the sea

The fish hang off the boat

700m away

In 7 shoals

Laughing at our 7cm eyeless flying fish

Which we wished

Would hood wink them a board

Into our gourmet galley

From which our Amanda serves

After her daily dose

Of 7 litres of squash,

7 star fishless food

7 layers of skin

Is what one loses

Whilst sailing under such a sun

Some 7 million billion trillion miles away

I’m tempted to peel myself away

‘Til my bones are exposed

And get a bit of colour about them

7 times

Or more

That skipper Steve has sailed this route

But never with such a crew

Including our fine 1^st mate

Gave in on giving up smokes

Some 17 hours into the trip

But has persisted

Along with others

In patiently explaining to me

Certain things

7 times over

So in 7 verses or so

The crew you now know

Leaving me

And I am tree

With my feet rooted in the teak of the toe-board

Head in the clouds