You trimmed wicks at three am
Salt crusted on your wool coat hem
Now you watch the taillights spin
The beam cuts where the road begins
Steel ribs arch above the tide
Your light paints stripes on windshield glass
Each car a blink you used to guide
Now they pass and pass and pass
The Fresnel lens gathers dust
Pavement hum replaces gust
You count headlights instead of waves
No ship to warn no crew to save
Steel ribs arch above the tide
Your light paints stripes on windshield glass
Each car a blink you used to guide
Now they pass and pass and pass
Gulls still cry at morning break
Their wings cut paths the headlights make
But traffic drowns their calling sound
Progress writes on concrete ground
Steel ribs arch above the tide
Your light paints stripes on windshield glass
Each car a blink you used to guide
Now they pass and pass and pass
Your logbook ends at ninety-four
The keeper's watch is needed no more
Now you pace the tower floor
Watching darkness chase the shore
No foghorn shakes the windowpane
No keeper climbs the iron stair
Just tires singing on the lane
And salt wind threading through your hair
You know each crack in the lens glass
The beam sweeps wide for all who pass
Each rhythm of the sweeping beam
It cuts the dark a steady gleam
Steel ribs arch above the tide
Your light paints stripes on windshield glass
Each car a blink you used to guide
Now they pass and pass and pass
The beam holds steady bright and fast
Last sweep catches chrome and steel
You tend the light you always will
