HMS Metaphor Edit 1.1ellajam,crow

[tectak]

tectak--this is a heavy edit that, I'm admitting, misses the point, but I think it's a necessary micro, and I hope it's useful.

So. Semicolons.

You did me a good turn bc I had to go get a refresher in their usage. In modern style, they either separate two "closely linked" (whatever that means) independent clauses or they function to create hierarchies in nested lists. There's an older usage where they'd mark a sharp turn in meaning, but that seems pretty woo-woo to me.

That said, the older "hairpin" usage could work here, if it's consistent.

And t h a t said, I don't think it is . . .

MICRO edit and proofread:

Ah, how fortune swings the points;
--a semicolon is as above--unless someone knows better . . . A *colon*, on the other hand, precedes a list of examples or an atomized set from a named whole (no, I don't know what that means, exactly).
--long and short is, I think you want a colon here. The rule-of-thumb I was taught is that a colon means "namely."

stars by night, lodestone by day.
North by South...we tack the winds[no comma here, preceding "that"]
--"North by South" is nonsensical. That's totally fine. But now I'm looking for a whirlpool or some other twisting force
--you don't tack winds, you tack in relation to winds

that once blew us the other way.
--what's the other way? North by south is opposites . . . I'm cool w this if it's for effect, though

Never turning into gale or by Charybdis, we’ll not go;
--I'm having trouble thinking how a ship would turn into a gale, as opposed to against or with
--should it be "into a gale" or "into gales"?
--the parallel clarifies things somewhat, but I'm left with a phrase that means "never risking sinking the ship"
--you've got a latent double-neg, but I'm not sure it's too problematic. It's easy to see if you swap the independent clause to the beginning, as in, "we'll not go never turning"

that arrow flight to Scylla aimed
is test enough so we scrape by.
--wasn't it a dove? Ask erthona. When I read the tale the distance betwixt C and S was an arrow flight."...SCYLLA (Skulla) and CHARYBDIS, the names of two rocks between Italy and Sicily, and only a short distance from one another. In the midst ... You will see the other cliff [opposite Skylla] lies lower, no more than an arrow's flight away. "
--the sense here is "we sailed between Scylla and Charybdis," so would you prefer "through" to "by"? nearer to the rock than to the roll

Good fortune brags out, loud proclaimed,
but tongues still lie...if we near die.
--I'm kind of alright w this construction, and . . . is lie--lie a crux ambiguity? Tongues lie as in deceive AND tongues lie as in rest silently? Yes. Duality of lies deliberate but easy

If we near die beneath the tide -- heaving, dragging deep below--
tell no one[I could use a comma here, but your call] but mark the spot; hoist sail, strain sheets and onward blow.
--I'd prefer to see an Oxford comma before "and"

Awkward seas confound us all, so through the spy-glass we must peer;
the promised land, a lighthouse beam
is all our inward prayers demand.
--I'd strongly recommend a comma after "beam"

But on this swell we live out dreams;
hopes come and go like sunken sands.
--to me, this is the only truly valid semicolon in the piece
--I can't get the visual of sunken sands coming and going . . .

Sunken sands will come and go; charts and maps can not make clear
--"can not" should be one word, no? I want you to say "can NOT" not cannot.

wither way to spin the wheel, or where to head or where to steer.
--I like the spinning quality here
--for the life of me, I can't locate this use of "wither" in any online reference. Is it legit?

Cast adrift[,] we rise, we fall, we spin, we toss, we plunge, we yaw.
--I love the swashbuckling tone here, but "yaw" takes me out of it, largely bc I only ever hear it on relation to a plane Believe me, boats yaw.

The skipper tells us we’ll survive,
--nix the comma here or, yes, use a semicolon, depending on the meaning

if we have faith all will be well.
--there needs to be some kinda punctuation between faith and all

Then Metaphor makes one last dive
to Davy’s Deep…the last Eighth Bell.
--cool image. maybe personify metaphor sooner?

---

Real quick, I'll bet it'd be an instant dramatic improvement if you put the last two lines up top and then allowed the Metaphor metaphor to ride through the rest of the poem

Hi crow,
Deep gratitude...this is what makes workshopping er...work.
I will take my time over your edit suggestions but make a few generally defensive points
The piece is tongue in cheek...my avatar. The nauticalities are based on my experience of sailing and are bent by that experience in the sense that you can only pretend to play the piano badly if you can play it well....which I don't. Or sail.
Your colonic observations are moot. Formal definitions of purpose, conflict with equally formal definitions of use...and in both camps you are more right than wrong.
I once asked my schoolday mentor when to use semi/colons and he told me succinctly, "When necessary". Further prodding over time produced the definitions which you gave but with reticence because there are difficult decisions to be made concerning the obverse arguement...that you should not use either when unnecessary BUT...and a big but it is...they ARE used outside your tight boundaries by writers of merit, often in poetry but also in reportage, for quite another purpose. They are used to introduce variable duration pauses. That is how I use them in poetry. More on this would take the thread to the Discussion forum.
Thank you again and watch out for a further edit.
Very best,
tectak