Sea Quest:

[tectak]

it looks like it's going to be completely different. can i ask if this meter works?

On the gently rocking boat I stood9A
in the swells of a turquoise sea;8B
a friendship sloop with a broadened beam9C
and a cabin just for me7B

In the world forgot, a sailor's knot9A
a breezy sail the west wind's tail8B
and those things that make a man forget9C
when he's gone beyond the pail7B[/b]

OK, billy. Let's get down to it. Syllable count does not necessarily dictate meter....suck that egg.....but it is a good starting point. Rhyme scheme does not have to carry from stanza to stanza....but it helps.
In the two stanzas above it would be difficult to believe that you didn't try to "fix" the syllable count as the two stanzas are 9,8,9,7 but a straight OUT LOUD read will show that the rhythm still works in spite of the 7 syllable end line.Why is this? Well, it is largely down to a phenomena of poetry!!! When we expect rhyme and don't get it we say that the piece "falters" BUT if we expect nothing all is well. The same applies to rhythm and the use of the crit word "falters" seems to be used indiscriminately to describe these two poetic constructs, even when accidentally employed by writers
You have done enough in these two stanzas to "lower" the expectation of a possible rhyme and so yes, it works! ABAB would not be difficult to achieve because it is often as difficult to AVOID a rhyme as it is to contrive one! It would seem churlish not to bring the RHYME scheme in to charted waters whilst in the area.
eg The stanzas can be so formalised thus, IF YOU WANT TO MAKE IT SO!

On the gently rocking boat I stood
in the swells of a turquoise sea
a friendship sloop of league worn wood
and a cabin just for me.

In a world unknown, a sailor's knot,
a taught sheet tugs the west wind's tail;
those things that many a man forgot
as he chased a billowed sail.

You will see now that the METER of S2 (now that it is established) relies upon the splitting of syllables (emphasis still natural, though!) so that:

(and/a)(cab/in)/just/for/me
sets the scheme in S2

thus
(as /he)/(chased /a)/ (bill/owed)/ sail.

Carry on like this and you will get brownie points from old purists like me but remember:

Be kind to your web-footed friends,
for a duck may be somebody's mother.
It lives on the edge of a swamp,
where the weather is very damp.
You may think that this is the end,
well it is.

Best,
tectak