Publication:Sea Talk Autumn 2008/Elemental - a sonnet for a RAN sailor

By Mark Allinson

The sea in the night calls my bones and tells

of the debt they owe to its elements:

of calcium soaked from its crush of shells;

of sodium distilled in filaments

of swaying kelp, churning nutrients

from oxygen, hydrogen and carbon

atoms that bond and crack in the solvents

of time and life; recycling silicon

in shifts of sand, and the nitrogen

falling with the sulphur of tropic skies;

it tells of the blood-debt owed to iron

and of phosphorus sparked in fish-cold eyes.

Your bones are mine, calls the sea in the black

depths of the night, and I will have them back.

A sonnet in honour of David Thomas Keith Allinson (pictured) who served in the RAN between 1943 and 1946 onboard HMAS Lonsdale and HMAS Australia, and saw action in the Pacific, including the Philippine liberation campaign, at Leyte Gulf and Lingayen Gulf. He began as an “Engine Room Artificer”, and attained the rank of Chief Petty Officer. He died in 1997 at the age of 75. Sons Mark (who penned the words) and Ross arranged for his ashes to be scattered at sea at Melville Point, near Tomakin, in accordance with his wishes.