My Little Boat is a true story of how a refugee named Assef left his home due to war and prejudice. Assef’s story traces a journey over land and sea, his rejection of citizenship everywhere he turned, and finally, his sad journey back to his homeland, starving, a broken man.
Fredrick Brooks - Guitars, Bass, Merlin and Lead Vocal
Chris Pezzarello - Drums, Doumbek and Percussion
Joy Brooks - Vocal Harmonies
Engineered by Giles DeHetre
Mixed, mastered by Fredrick Brooks and Chris Pezzarello
Recorded at Hillcrest Studio
Print by Ruth Read
This weeks prose is from my journal collection, Remnants. I wrote it for my father’s brother Albert, who tragically drowned at very young age. I imagined his life by tracing the lives of his surviving brothers, their journey being the blue print of how I wished it could have been for Albert. The only photo I have of him is coloured and I’ve included it below the prose.
<Click here to listen to My Little Boat>
My Little Boat
I am on my way home
Through the dark hope marks my road
Years of waiting
Over sea and stone I carry this load
Chorus
My little boat sailed a sea of dreams
Into shadow where my heart would grieve
I am barely breathing
For deep in my heart lies a story untold
It whispers memories
As I walk in silence on my own
Chorus
Still you deny me
Like I’m skin and bone left to roam
Why this sorrow
Where is the light without home
Chorus
I am on my way home
Through the dark hope marks my road
© Fredrick Brooks 2017
++++++++++++
ALBERT
A boy in a boat – A boy in water – Swimming – Crossing the river – Beneath the Don.
If he hadn’t drowned that day
A few years later - I imagine him walking the shop floor, his work smock dirty, his face covered in sweat, like his brothers before him, he was called to the line – Albert’s cigarette, his eternal sidekick dangles from his lips, between jaundiced fingers he pinches the red glow tossing it to the cement floor, grinding it with his heel, a union man, serious and gritty.
A girl, soon wife – a family – a house with a yard – roast beef on Sundays – a penny ante night of cards with the family - hockey on the radio – then the war calls. So many comrades die, boots in the trenches – rats feasting on bones and flesh, the spoils of war. He’s stricken, suffers, yet somehow, a part of him survives.
Home – his heart aches from the losses – so much death – night visions haunt him – Visitations from the dead pound his bedroom door. Still he loves life, after so much loss.
Albert a Father, an Uncle, soon a Grandfather retires to the north.
A boy in a boat – A boy in water – Swimming – Crossing the river – Beneath the Don.
If he hadn’t drowned that day
For my Fathers Brother - Albert
© Fredrick Brooks 2022
