Beside the mainmast. Starbuck leans against the thick wooden beam.
My soul is completely outmatched. I am overwhelmed‑‑and by a madman.
It burns unbearably, that sanity must surrender on such a battlefield.
But he dug deep inside me and blew my good‑sense all to pieces.
I believe I can see his ungodly fate ahead. Yet I feel forced to help bring that fate about.
Whether I want to or not, some unnameable power has bound me to him. He drags me along with a rope I have no knife strong enough to cut.
Terrible old man.
He shouts that no one stands above him. Yes‑‑he acts like he defies every higher power, yet look how he dominates everyone beneath him.
I see my wretched duty all too clearly. I must obey, even while I rebel inside. Worse still, I hate him, and at the same time feel a flicker of pity.
I catch glimpses of some terrible suffering in his eyes‑‑suffering that would consume me if I carried it.
Still, there is hope. Time and the tides run broad and free.
That hated whale has the whole wide ocean to swim in, just like a little goldfish inside its glass bowl.
God might yet push aside his blasphemous obsession.
I would lift my spirits, but my heart feels heavy as lead. My whole inner clock has run down. My heart is its main weight, and I have no key to wind it back up again.
Loud drunken celebration bursts out forward on the forecastle deck.
Oh God, to sail with such heathen‑spirited men. Hardly a trace of gentle mother‑tamed humanity left in them.
They might as well have been spawned by the shark‑infested sea. That white whale has become their dark idol.
Listen to that hell‑bent carousing. Up forward they roar, while back here aft hangs a heavy, unbroken silence.
It feels like a picture of human life itself.
The bright, noisy bow cuts merrily across glittering waves, full of banter and fight‑‑yet it drags gloomy Ahab behind it. He broods in his stern cabin, built over the churned dead water of the ship’s wake, haunted by its wolf‑like gurgles.
That long wild cheer sends a shiver straight through my bones.
Quiet, you revellers! Set the watch now.
Oh life. It is in moments like this, when my soul is crushed and forced to face hard truth‑‑much like wild, unbroken creatures made to eat what they are given‑‑oh life, this is when I taste the hidden horror inside you.
But that horror is not part of who I am. It lies outside of me.
Even with my soft human feelings still alive inside, I will struggle against you, you grim ghost‑like futures.
Stand beside me. Hold me fast. Tie me firm, all you blessed saving powers.