Somewhere in the Queue

A black-breasted red Onagadori rooster with long orange-red hackles and a very long black tail trailing across the deck, seated upright in a wooden deckchair on the deck of a ship in a pale blue cotton jacket, white shirt and cream Panama hat, a glass of water on a folding table beside him, cargo ships and tankers at anchor on a flat grey sea beyond the white rail, green hills on the horizon under an overcast sky

Gatún, Eventually

Someone paid a small fortune to go first through the locks, and every ship at anchor is doing the sums. His is not. He has a deckchair, a hat named after the place, and every intention of arriving whenever the water allows.

28 August 2026